Driving and drinking under the legal limit can prove deadlier for others

Driving with a blood-alcohol level below the legal 0.08% limit still causes a significant fraction of fatal crashes — nearly 34,000 of more than 600,000 alcohol-related motor vehicle deaths from 2000 through 2015 —  and a new study based on those 16 years of national data notes some differences. A little more than half of the people who died in accidents involving blood-alcohol concentrations below the legal mark were not the drivers. These crashes were also more likely to kill young people under 21. Drivers’ cognitive impairment can begin at blood alcohol levels as low as 0.03% and states that have lowered their limits to 0.05% have seen motor vehicle crashes drop.