Texting -- the modern way to run with scissors?

All this unfettered communication must be more dangerous than it seems. 

This week, the American College of Emergency Physicians issued an alert about the dangers of ... text messaging. Yes, text messaging. That thing you do with the cellphone keypad. Apparently, emergency docs around the country have reported seeing injuries involving texting pedestrians, bicyclists, rollerbladers and of course motorists.

True, two recent deaths have been blamed on moving texters. (Both were in California.) One pedestrian stepped off the curb into the path of a truck; another was hit crossing the street. These are tragic, of course. But there's also been a report of an injury that occurred while a texter was horseback riding and another that occurred while cooking.

Somehow it seems that texting might not be the biggest issue here.

As Newsweek reports: "Most involve scrapes, cuts and sprains from texters who walked into lampposts or walls or tripped over curbs." Let me repeat part of that: "who walked into lampposts." I'd almost pay to see that.

If you need tips on how to text safely, here you go. Or if you want to know how to wring every last bit of information from a single letter, baffling anyone old enough to legally drink, here's this.

But if you're wondering about some bigger injury and death issues, here's this. A sample: 30,694 firearm deaths, 32,691 poisoning deaths and 43,667 traffic deaths. There's more: 18,124 homicides and 32,637 suicides. Those numbers are from 2005, courtesy of the National Center for Health Statistics.

I'm not trying to dismiss the importance of this issue, mind you... But well, yeah, maybe I am.

-- Tami Dennis

Photo credit: Lori Shepler/ Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Daniel W Rasmus]

Several years ago, when working with researchers at MIT on wearable computing, I coined the term Digital Autism to describe the effect wearable computers had on people's focus on attention. People wearing computers ttended to pay more attention to the information in front of them than the world around them, even if the technology allowed them to see through the data. The same was true of relationships. When people were wearing devices they tended to focus more on the relationships in the data, or those they were interacting with in cyberspace, than those in the room around them.

Read more at : http://future-of-work.spaces.live.com

[cynthia]

I have observed so-oooo many pedestrians crossing the street while texting, not paying attention to their surroundings, walking too slowly and sometimes unaware the traffic signal has changed, forcing drivers to either slam on their brakes or wait endlessly for the morons to make it onto the curb, clueless to the fact they are putting themselves and others in danger of injury.
I have also been close to being hit by people texting in their cars.
People need to get a grip here.
Maybe a hefty ticket or two would help bring them down to earth.

[Tempest]

My life isn't that complicated. I hardly ever text. Come to think of it I'm one of the few people that let my cell phone wring when I am talking to someone.
Learned a long time ago I don't need to be in touch.

[Emily]

You said it all. Anyone silly enough to walk off a curb into traffic while texting (or talking on the phone for that matter) deserves whatever fate befalls them. Wake up and smell the tailpipe fumes. What's happened to people?

[Aaron]

I agree, cell phones and texting in public/traffic are NOW a dangerous epidemic.

I refuse to talk on my phone while driving but a few times that I have, realized I didn't remember any detail of my surroundings, couldn't tell you what cars I saw on the freeway, which lanes I changed, if I was going too slow, too fast, couldn't tell you if a jerk cut me off in a red camaro--I don't remember any detail, don't remember looking in my rear view mirror, don't remember the route I took to get home just that I go there, it's as if the brain shuts off cause it's on the phone and instinct takes over (almost like drinking and driving I'd think) I wouldn't feel safe using a "blue tooth" either, being in a conversation is distracting, I'd rather not talk on the phone, remember too, the one's pushing blue tooth and talk any time minues are phone companies making money the more you talk, so it's pushed into culture! I say refuse, tell people off if they don't get it, relax, this "I need to know now" mentality is selfish panicky destructive behaviour IMHO and helps noone.