Californians among most likely in nation to use seat belts, federal health officials report

Motorists and passengers in California, Oregon and Washington state have the highest seat-belt use in the country, according to a new report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Oregon -- where nearly 94% of people said they always wore a seat belt -- ranked No. 1, according to a CDC telephone survey. California was close behind in self-reported seat belt use at 93.2%, followed by Washington state at 92%.

All three states have strict enforcement of safety belt laws –- allowing police to pull a vehicle over solely because they see an occupant not wearing a safety belt.

The states where residents were least likely to say they wore a seat belt include New Hampshire, the only state without a mandatory seat belt law. Only 66.4% in the “Live Free or Die” state said they always buckled up.

Two states reported even lower rates: South Dakota at 59.7% and North Dakota at 59.2%. Both are among places where police are allowed to issue tickets for lack of safety belt use only if drivers are pulled over for another moving violation.

South Dakota enacted its mandatory seat belt law in 1995, the last of the states with laws to do so.

Safety belts are a relatively new thing, with the first mandatory safety belt law enacted in New York state in 1984. Motor vehicle crashes remain the leading cause of death in the United States among people ages 5 to 34 years old, but using seat belts has significantly reduced injuries, the CDC said.

In a study published in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report Tuesday, scientists found that the injury rate among motor vehicle occupants dropped 16% between 2001 and 2009. Over a similar period, 2002 to 2008, self-reported seat-belt use rose from 81% to 85%.

“Yet, about 1 in 7 adults do not wear a seat belt on every trip. If everyone in the vehicle buckled up every time, we could further reduce one of the leading causes of death,” CDC director Thomas Frieden said in a statement.

Still, the data showed a sea change in attitudes toward safety belts from a generation ago.

“Self-reported seat-belt use … is now the social norm among residents of the United States,” the CDC report said. “In contrast, in 1982, only 11% of U.S. residents reported seat-belt use.”

California implemented its strict enforcement law in 1993. As of January 2011, a total of 31 states had strict safety belt enforcement laws.

The report's authors said the strengthening of such laws over the last decade in more than a dozen states has played a major role in a drop in the rate of motor vehicle fatalities.

In states with stricter safety belt enforcement, 88% of motor vehicle occupants said they were always belted in. In states with less strict laws, only 79% said they always used the belts.

Seat belts reduce the risk of fatal injuries from crashes by about 45%, the CDC said. The agency urged states to enhance enforcement of the safety belt law.

If all states had strict safety belt enforcement laws, nearly 450 lives would have been saved in 2009 and 12,000 injuries prevented, the CDC said, citing data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

U.S. fatality rates from motor vehicle collisions are nearly double those of many high-income European countries, the report said. It said those European countries had higher safety belt use rates.

Chris Cochran, spokesman for the California Office of Traffic Safety, said a separate observational study done by the state in the summer of 2010 found an even higher use of safety belts in the Golden State, at 96%. Cochran attributed the high compliance to extensive enforcement and extensive signage warning, “Click it or ticket.”

“We even have permanent highway signs throughout the entire state, every 40 miles,” he said.  “People in California get the message.”

Still, he said, there were about 300 to 400 people who died last year on California roadways whose deaths could have been prevented had they been wearing safety belts.

Another troubling finding, the CDC found, was that teenagers and young adults were less likely to buckle up compared with older people. Drivers between 16 and 24 years old have the highest rates of injury and death from auto crashes, the CDC said.

“Teens are kind of the last bastion of holdouts. … It hasn’t become a habit for them, like it has for most of us. And they still have to get over the coolness factor. Most everything that your parents tell you to do is uncool, even though it’ll help save your life,” Cochran said.

“The deadliest six months of a teen’s life is the first six months after they get their driver’s license,” Cochran added.

Men were less likely to report using seat belts than women, as were rural residents compared with urban residents. In terms of race and ethnicity, whites, blacks and Native Americans were less likely to say they used seat belts than Latinos and Asians.

But even among populations resistant to seat belts, they were more likely to comply with the law in states with stronger enforcement, the CDC found.

“There are some people who won’t change unless they’re hit in the pocketbook,” Cochran said.

The CDC data was collected from the 2008 data of the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, a health survey conducted by telephone, to estimate seat-belt use among adults. It also used 2009 data from the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, a national sample of hospitals in the United States, to provide estimates of injured occupants of motor vehicles who are treated in emergency rooms.

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-- Rong-Gong Lin II

Charts: Seat-belt use by sex, age, and type of law, U.S., 2008. Source: CDC Vital Signs

Comments

[Robert]

If you're not wearing a seat belt and your car suddenly stops, due to hitting an obstruction or another car, your body will impact the interior of your car at about the same speed you were traveling at impact. You may also be ejected from the car, hit the pavement at a high rate of speed, and/or have your car or someone else's roll on top of you. Why anyone would purposely not wear a seat belt is a mystery of human nature.

[technovik]

nothing but an outright extortion ticket!!!!

[AL]

Of course we wear our seatbelts, otherwise we face fines imposed by our government, who is only looking out for our interests.

[mike]

lame story, who cares

[CALIFORNIAMARTY]

California finally leads the nation in something positive. That is progress!

[JC]

Its not that people really care if they wear a seat belt, its that you will get a $200 plus ticket if the cops bust you.

[Tomslick345]

So a person doesn't wear their seatbelt, crashes their car, their fault, totalling it. They get seriously hurt and are unable to work and support themselves or their family. Who gets stuck with the bill? Can you guess?

[Gregg]

An old college buddy and his wife felt it was a matter of their personal freedom to not wear seat belts... until they found themselves in a head-on collision and were free to have a face-to-face confrontation with the dashboard and windshield. They recovered alright, but they wear their seat belts now. Lucky.

[Edward]

While I am generally pleased with the premise of the article - Californians AGAIN lead the nation in automotive prowess - I disagree with the ten paragraphs of supporting rationale.

"Click it or ticket" is stupid and annoying, as is Chris Cochran and his entire department, and frankly I hope they're on Gov. Brown's chopping block. I cannot imagine it actually have any effect on sentient beings with more than 3 brain cells to rub together.

We're not an authoritarian state. We don't change our behavior just because there's a law on the books. I think a much greater influencing causation of Californians wearing seat belts is .. duh, it's a really good idea and can save your life in a fast lane mishap.

Oh, and one last comment: "If all states had strict safety belt enforcement laws, nearly 450 lives would have been saved in 2009 and 12,000 injuries prevented, the CDC said, citing data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration." That is sheer speculation out of someone's orifice, and is worth repeating only to say it's a load of .. well, you know.

[ALex May]

Princess Diana who was killed in a car crash was not wearing a seat belt. Her bodyguard who was in the front passenger seat and wearing a seat belt survived.

[julie]

when i was five (in 1974, btw) i was in an accident where i was ejected through the windshield of a truck. i landed face-first on the 91 freeway. i sustained a massive head injury, the effects of which i still deal with - memory problems, debilitating headaches, etc.

as soon as i knew what the hell a seat belt was and what using one would prevent, i started wearing one. my parents thought i was silly. i don't think they ever wore their seat belts.

sometimes i wish i could force people like mike (who thinks the story is lame) or AL to trade brains with me for a week. mine's messed up enough that i wish there had been a law making people buckle up about 20 years sooner.

[Mark M]

The reporter forgot to mention that a person can also get a ticket, at least in California, if you are not wearing the seat belt PROPERLY. I live in Southern California and was in a car that was pulled over recently. I was the passenger. The motorcycle officer walked up to the passnger side of the car and asked if I knew why I was pulled over. I said "no." He said it was because in California we have a "click it or ticket law" (referring to the seatbelt). I said "see I have my seat fastened." He said, "but you have it under your shoulder and not over your shouder." I couldn't believe it! I was handed a ticket that cost me $160 (or so...can't quite remember--trying to block it out of my mind!) To me it seems like revenue generation, pure and simple. What's next?

[Melvin]

I invite all men and women to vote for democracy next time. May God bless those who vote for Democracy. May God bless who support me. I will decide to vote for democracy and remove the vote for republicans for now on. God bless America if they vote for democracy. I bless all the men and women who vote for democracy and not for the republicans.

[thomas]

JC - It would be nice if people would do the right thing on their own but that isn't the case

[John]

reason why no one wants to get a ticket is because they don't want to wait in long as lines

[Gary S]

It has never really been about safety.It is for nothing but revenue and a reason to pull people over to see what their up too, all in the name of safety

[Gabriel]

If you have ever driven in California you would know your life depends on it.....I personally seen at least five or six rollovers.... and many other crashes... jumping off the off ramps are my personal favorites or those ones you see and say how the heck did that get up there.... just the other day a BMW doing about 60 mph started to spin out in the rain went across 5 lanes off the freeway hit a light post backwards then spun down hill into the trees... i thought was safe until the light post fell into the freeway taking up three lanes. hell this one a women decided to cut a semi off on a on ramp and he did not stop...we spent 15 min trying to pull her out of the crushed car... when we fianlly got to her she had her seat belt on but was hit sideway so her body was laid out over both seats her head in pool of blood in the passanger seat bleeding form her eyes ,nose, and ears...yes she died ...had 3 kids and a huband. Moral of the story ..unless you are a good driver who is not scared to drive at 80 mph during an turn they you should not drive on California freeways...stay on the streets

[garry]

I had a teacher that got hit on the driver side door. she was not wearing her seat belt luckily she realized the car was not stopping and quickly jumped from the driver seat to the passenger seat. if she was wearing her seat belt she would have been seriously injured. but instead only had minor injuries. seat belt law is for revenue. plain and simple

[Debbie]

Now if we can just get people to use their turn signals we'd be in good shape!

[lucygoosey]

I think it's a shame that folks have to be forced to take measures to save their lives. That's why we "big brother" to sort of guide us in the way we should go. My big brother,also, told me about smoking, trans fats, processed sugar, getting proper exercise, STDs, and to watch cholesterol/blood pressure, etc. A lot of these things and more, I did not know before they mentioned it, I'm glad and grateful.

[REA]

Ticket? Na. Kissing the steering wheel with your face in a collision? No way. It's that damn seat belt not fastened chiming sound that makes me wear that frickin' belt!

[1stresponce]

Yea... Thats because we know we have the worst drivers in the the nation here in CA.

[Compliant Citizen #65143095]

Ah yes, the good old revenue generator known as seat belt laws. Right up there with forced motorcycle helmets, drug prohibition and every other law that assigns a dollar value penalty for choices that affect nobody but the one making it.

Hows that freedom taste, citizen? Hope you are wearing your helmet and seat belt while enjoying it otherwise there will be a $100 ticket issued for Improper Enjoyment of Freedom.

[gepids]

Who was that actor, pretty famous. Was in a motorcycle accident, was not wearing a helmet because it's a personal choice. Did he have a TBI? Who was that, what is he doing now?

[Bob's Your Uncle]

I started wearing a seat belt about 40 years ago when I owned a car with a bench seat. It kept me from sliding around on turns. It became such a habit that it feels strange if I don't use one.