Gov. Josh Green and state legislators have again submitted bills lowering the illegal blood alcohol content (BAC) for drivers from 0.08% to 0.05%. We must support their efforts in the face of perennial opposition.
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Commission (NHTSA), about 37 people in the United States die in drunken driving crashes every day — that’s one person every 39 minutes. In 2022, 13,524 people died in alcohol-impaired driving traffic deaths. These deaths were all preventable. One proven way to reduce these unacceptable numbers is to reduce the current .08 level of blood alcohol concentration permitted for drivers of vehicles.
The 0.05 BAC is the international standard, covering 85% of the world’s population in more than 100 countries. Specifically, all states in Australia have a 0.05 BAC limit. France, Austria, Italy, Spain and Germany have lowered their limit to 0.05 BAC, while Sweden, Norway, Japan and Russia have set their limit at 0.02 BAC. The law in China, Brazil and Canada is 0.05 BAC.
In most of those countries, traffic fatalities in which drivers had an illegal BAC are under 25%, with many falling in the single-digit range. And when these countries lowered their BAC to 0.05 or less, fatal alcohol-related crashes declined an average 11.1%.
But America, astonishingly, clings tenaciously to 0.08 BAC along with Liechtenstein, Malta and Northern Ireland among others.
The 0.05 threshold is supported by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the National Highway Transportation Safety Board, the World Health Organization and numerous public health and traffic safety organizations in Hawaii and other states.
The world’s largest brewer, the ABInBev Foundation, makers of Budweiser, Corona, Michelob and a dozen other leading brands, agrees with the World Health Organization that a 0.05 BAC limit is best practice at this time. They recognize that this BAC level prevents drinking and driving and encourages people to seek alternative transportation options, including rideshare and designated driver options.
The five-year experience of Utah, the only U.S. state so far using 0.05, shows that alcohol sales and sales tax revenues from restaurants, rental cars, hotels, air travel and resorts continued to trend upward following the state’s implementation of the 0.05 BAC law. Alcohol sales there have actually increased 28% since the introduction of 0.05 BAC in 2018. In trying to explain the rising trends in sales in the alcohol and hospitality industries in Utah, many experts hypothesize that customers may feel free to drink more when they know they have a ride home.
Mothers Against Driving Hawaii, Gov. Green, the Hawaii Department of Transportation, all four county police departments, many safety-conscious state legislators and, critically, the victims and survivors of 100% preventable drunken driving crashes in Hawaii, need the public’s help in changing the mindset of those lawmakers who have refused to advance this law for years.
Don’t let them get away with it again in 2025. Please call or email your state representative and senator and urge them to finally pass 0.05 BAC.
Arkie Koehl is public policy committee chairman for Mothers Against Driving Hawaii.
