Phone use is the leading cause of distracted driving on our roads

Using a mobile phone while driving remains the leading cause of distraction on our roads. It is responsible for no fewer than 390 deaths a year. That Instagram photo, or the obligatory selfie, may cost you more than you thought…

Using a mobile phone while driving causes 390 deaths a year. These are the figures that the DGT has recently made public in an attempt to raise drivers’ awareness of the dangers this entails…

The study, titled “Smartphones: the impact of mobile phone addiction on road accidents”, carried out by the foundation Línea Directa in collaboration with the University Institute for Traffic and Road Safety Research of the University of Valencia, determines how dangerous it is to use this device while driving.

The study finds that 20% of road fatalities are caused by mobile phone distraction, that is, one in every five road accidents, which adds up to a total of 8,000 accidents with casualties.

These figures make mobile phone use “one of the main causes of road deaths, on a par with alcohol or drug use”.

A rough estimate suggests that no fewer than 13,000,000 people use their mobile phone while driving almost every day at certain times of the day, whether to change a song or to read a newly received message. This data was obtained from the results of 1,700 surveys carried out among drivers, and the results are, to say the least, worrying.

The study also finds that, out of those 13,000,000 people, 600,000 see themselves as genuine phone addicts and admit they cannot stop looking at their phone while at the wheel.

In this video we can see examples of accidents caused by phone use:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDx37445JS0

As if that were not enough, almost 2 million motorists take selfies while driving, especially younger people aged between 18 and 35, whose desire, in many cases, to stand out on social media drives them to commit truly foolish acts such as the one in question.

The accidents that usually result from this kind of distraction are mostly lane departures and rear-end collisions, mainly involving drivers travelling alone, in passenger cars, at the start and end of the working week, and in good weather and traffic conditions. These accidents are often very violent, since we realise too late the obstacles or dangers ahead.

Of course, traffic lights and traffic jams are where the device is most often used, with the typical excuse of “being stopped, or being bored”.

It is clear that the mobile phone and the steering wheel are not good friends, and that a sufficient level of responsibility on the part of drivers should be enough to solve this major problem, because as always, “nothing may happen to you, until it eventually does”…