In my lectures, I often provide
context about the risks associated with use of tobacco products by comparing
those behaviors with the use of automobiles.
Putting risk in context is important, as can be demonstrated by focusing
on traffic safety data alone.
The U.S. National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) recently reported that there were 35,092
traffic fatalities in 2015 – a small increase from the previous year (here). Some media reports treated the incremental
change as if it demonstrated a growing epidemic. National Public Radio headlined their story,
“Largest increase in decades” (here), and
CBS called it the “Largest increase in a half century” (here). Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said in
a press release (here), “…far
too many people are killed on our nation's roads every year…we're issuing a
call to action and asking researchers, safety experts, data scientists, and the
public to analyze the fatality data and help find ways to prevent these
tragedies.”
Reducing carnage is certainly
a worthy goal, but NHTSA ought to kill the hype and present traffic fatality
statistics in a meaningful fashion. In
past years, NHTSA framed fatality rates based on population (e.g., deaths per
100,000 residents) or on vehicle miles traveled (see Table 2 of last year’s
report here). Those rates are more meaningful than press
release hyperbole such as, “2,348 more people died in traffic crashes compared
to previous year.” (here)
This year’s NHTSA report
downplayed the miles traveled rate and omitted the population rate. Fortunately, using Census Bureau data, one
can calculate the latter. The chart shows
both rates since 2005.
Traffic fatality rates, after
falling almost continuously for several decades, have been stable since around
2009. The small 2014/2015 uptick to 11
deaths per 100,000 population or 1 billion miles traveled is not an increase of
epidemic proportions.
The risk of traveling by
automobile in the U.S. remains very small.
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