Death and Injury from Motor Vehicle Crashes

The reductions in CFR, probably from small drops in speed of impact account for the disproportionately greater drop in death tolls in the United Kingdom compared to the United States. The temporal fit between drops in CFR and deaths following the introduction of speed cameras in the United Kingdom and increases in speed (speed creep), CFR, and deaths in the United States following raised speed limits suggests that diverging changes in speeds of impact accounted mainly for these changes. Use of D/BVKM to correct for exposure concealed the lack of progress after 1990 in the United States, since falling time trends in D/BVKM reflect increases in congestion. If the United States had implemented United Kingdom-type speed control policies and not raised speed limits, there would have been an estimated 6500 to 10,000 (∼16% to 25%) fewer road deaths per year during the period following speed-limit increases (1996 to 1999), including many DUI-related deaths. Reductions of up to 50% are now achievable based on newer population-wide strategies for speed control.