Open AccessBans on Cellphone Use While Driving and Traffic Fatalities in the United States
Author(s) -
Motao Zhu,
Sijun Shen,
Donald A. Redelmeier,
Li Li,
Lai Wei,
Robert D. Foss
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
epidemiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.901
H-Index - 173
eISSN - 1531-5487
pISSN - 1044-3983
DOI - 10.1097/ede.0000000000001391
Subject(s) - relative risk , distracted driving , demography , environmental health , medicine , population , poison control , injury prevention , phone , occupational safety and health , advertising , confidence interval , business , linguistics , philosophy , pathology , sociology
As of January 2020, 18 of 50 US states comprehensively banned almost all handheld cellphone use while driving, 3 states and the District of Columbia banned calling and texting, 27 states banned texting on a handheld cellphone, and 2 states had no general cellphone ban for all drivers. However, it remains unknown whether these bans were associated with fewer traffic deaths and whether comprehensive handheld bans are more effective than isolated calling or texting bans. We evaluated whether cellphone bans were associated with fewer driver, non-driver, and total fatalities nationally.