National Teen Driver Safety Week --- October 19--25, 2008

October 19--25 is National Teen Driver Safety Week. In 2006, a total of 4,144 teens aged 16--19 years died, and nearly 400,000 were treated in emergency departments for injuries sustained in motor-vehicle crashes in the United States (1,2).

By delaying full driving privileges so that teens can gain driving experience under low-risk conditions, comprehensive graduated driver licensing systems can reduce fatal and nonfatal injury crashes of drivers aged 16 years by as much as 38% and 40%, respectively (3). Extending the learner permit period, restricting night-time driving, and limiting teen passengers each contribute to crash reductions (4). Raising the minimum drinking age to 21 years and enforcing "zero" blood alcohol levels for teen drivers also have reduced motor-vehicle--related deaths and injuries. (5).

Information about teen driver safety and National Teen Driver Safety Week are available from CDC at http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/duip/spotlite/teendrivers.htm, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration at http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov, and the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia at http://stokes.chop.edu/programs/injury/our_research/ydri.php.

References

1. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) encyclopedia. Available at http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov.
2. CDC. Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS). Available at http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/wisqars.
3. Baker SP, Chen L, Li G. Nationwide review of graduated driver licensing. Washington, DC: AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety; 2007. Available at http://www.aaafoundation.org/pdf/nationwidereviewofgdl.pdf.
4. Williams AF. Contribution of the components of graduated licensing to crash reductions. J Safety Research 2007;38:177--84.
5. Shults RA, Elder RW, Sleet DA, et al. Reviews of evidence regarding interventions to reduce alcohol-impaired driving. Am J Prev Med 2001;21(4S):66--88.

Use of trade names and commercial sources is for identification only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. References to non-CDC sites on the Internet are provided as a service to MMWR readers and do not constitute or imply endorsement of these organizations or their programs by CDC or the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. CDC is not responsible for the content of pages found at these sites. URL addresses listed in MMWR were current as of the date of publication.

All MMWR HTML versions of articles are electronic conversions from typeset documents. This conversion might result in character translation or format errors in the HTML version. Users are referred to the electronic PDF version (http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr) and/or the original MMWR paper copy for printable versions of official text, figures, and tables. An original paper copy of this issue can be obtained from the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO), Washington, DC 20402-9371; telephone: (202) 512-1800. Contact GPO for current prices.

Date last reviewed: 10/15/2008