Does Seat Belt use Save Lives
Seat belts save lives. If there’s any doubt about this, take a look at the NHTSAwebsite. They estimate that some 13,000 lives are saved EVERY YEAR through seat belt use. Sadly though, this number could be even higher. According to the sampling carried out by the NHTSA, in 2011seatbelt usage was around 84%. In other words, road users are unbelted 16% of the time. It’s estimated that if usage could be increased to 90% some 1,600 additional lives would be saved each year.
How do then NHTSA know this? The rise in seat belt usage, (up from just 58% in 1994,) has been mirrored by a decline in the number of “unrestrained passenger vehicle occupant fatalities.” Put simply, fewer people are dying because more people are wearing their seat belt.
So who is buckling up, and more importantly, who isn’t?
Well first a note on how the data is gathered. Every year the NHTSA randomly select points alongside various roads, and observe who is wearing their seat belt. But they only take the survey between 7 a.m. and 6 p.m.. Thus it’s quite possible that seatbelt usage is lower during the evening and nighttime hours.
No drivers are stopped for the survey, so there’s no detailed demographic information, but despite that, some trends are clear. As reported by theSafety Council:
Women are more likely to be buckled up than men. The numbers for 2008 were 86% versus 81%. Those counted as “black” buckle up at a lower rate than those considered white. The numbers are 79% versus 83%. And if you’re wondering how these groups can both be below the average of 84% it’s probably because a group classed as “another race” buckle up 89% of the time. Seat belt use is lowest among those in the 16 to 24 year old age group. Around 86% of van and SUV occupants wear the seat belts but only 72% of those in pickup trucks do the same.
There are a couple of other interestingobservationsburied in the data. A driver alone in the vehicle is slightly less likely to wear a seat belt than when they’re traveling with a passenger. And rates of seat belt usage are far from uniform across the country. Michigan has the highest rate, at 98%, according to numbers published by theNational Safety Council, while in Wyoming just 67.6% of road users buckle up.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, state-to-state variations seem to correlate with where seat belt usage is a primary law, (meaning a driver can be pulled over for not wearing one.) Those states where a driver cannot be stopped just for not wearing a belt – the Dakota’s, Idaho and Utah for example – have a usage rate around 12% lower.
So what does all this tell us?
Well statistically speaking, we can be confident in saying that a middle-aged Asian female driving a minivan in Michigan is probably wearing her seat belt. On the other hand, a black 17 year old male driving a pickup truck through the plains states may well be unrestrained.
These are sweeping statements of course, and we should not be too quick to draw conclusions from the data. But there again, the statistics make it very clear that, when worn, seat belts save lives.
