7. Conclusions

About 40 percent of all motor vehicle traffic crash fatalities in the United States in 2003 occurred in crashes that were alcohol-related (BAC of .01 or above). This is the first decrease in alcohol-related fatalities since 1999, at which point these fatalities began to increase.

Although alcohol involvement cannot be interpreted as a direct causal relationship between alcohol use and any other attribute of fatal crashes, it does provide insight into the extent of impaired driving along various categories that are of interest to those involved in policy making and directing impaired-driving countermeasures.

The analyses presented in this report show that a majority (86 %) of the persons killed in alcohol-related crashes themselves had alcohol or were riding in a vehicle driven by a person with alcohol.

Higher alcohol involvement was observed among drivers who were involved in single-vehicle crashes, nighttime crashes, and weekend crashes, as well as those drivers who had prior DWI convictions.

Also, passengers killed in alcohol-related crashes who were riding with a driver with alcohol were most likely to be in the same age range as the driver.

About three-fourths of children (under age 16) killed in alcohol-related crashes were passengers in a vehicle. Of those, about two-thirds were riding in a vehicle in which the driver had alcohol.

A majority of the alcohol-related crashes that killed pedestrians were single-vehicle crashes. About 70 percent of these pedestrian fatalities occurred in urban areas. Furthermore, a majority of these crashes occurred at night.