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Texting Bans for Drivers: Are They Effective or a Waste of Legislative Time?

California has some of the strictest texting and driving laws in the country. In this state, it’s not even legal to enter any information into a phone that’s being used as a GPS, as long as the driver is behind the wheel. These laws have gotten stricter over the years, but do they work?

We know how difficult it can be to measure whether these bans do in fact impact road safety. There’s no question that texting while driving is dangerous – many studies have proven this fact – but the reality is that not all drivers follow the law and will text, send emails, etc. while driving. A recent story by CBS News discussed a long-term, large-scale study that was designed to find out if these texting bans make people safer. Read on to learn more and then contact Law Offices of Fernando D. Vargas at 909-982-0707 for a free legal consultation.

The study looked at hospitalizations

The study in question reviewed info that was found on hospitalizations that resulted from car crashes in states that had passed strict texting laws after 2003 but before 2011. The study looked at the rates at which people were hospitalized after a car accident to see if there was a decline in states that had prohibited texting while driving.

The researchers took care to account for other factors as well. For example, they took speeding and drunk driving into consideration, as well as the laws that had changed in the same period that affected speeding and drunk driving.

The results of the study

The study found that there was a reduction of about 7% in hospitalizations after car crashes for states that had put a texting ban in place. They found that the largest reduction happened in areas where primary enforcement laws were put into place.

The traffic safety laws were put into two categories: Primary-enforcement or secondary-enforcement. Primary-enforcement laws are laws in which the police are able to pull over a car for texting while driving. Secondary-enforcement means that they can only issue a citation for texting while driving if the driver was already pulled over for another reason.

California is a primary-enforcement state

In the state of California, a drive can be pulled over just for violating our strict distracted driving laws. In fact, this is true in most states in the U.S. Only five states don’t have texting bands, and of the 45 that do have texting bans, only five of them have them as secondary-enforcement laws.

If you have been involved in a car, bus, or truck accident in which you believe the driver was texting, then it’s time to contact an attorney. At Law Offices of Fernando D. Vargas we have decades of experience and a winning track record. Call today at 909-982-0707 to get a free legal consultation. In the event we decide to work together, we will take your case on a contingency basis. This means that you don’t pay a cent until we win your case for you.