COVID restrictions are winding down and the weather is heating up. This means that many of us will be heading to vacation in the coming months and potentially traveling more for work. After a year of quarantine and masks, many of us welcome the thought of social gathers and toes in the sand.
As our driving increases, it’s a good time to reevaluate how you drive and identify some habits to kick for our #postcovid driving. These tips not only keep you and others safe, but can also directly impact your insurance premium.
1. Putting on makeup - There’s something unsettling about driving down the road and looking over to see the driver in the car beside you putting on makeup while intently staring in the mirror going 70 mph. Yikes! While it is great that masks are no longer mandatory and makeup can be worn more frequently, consider this: around 7% of all distracted driving accidents are caused by drivers applying makeup. Don’t do it! Hit the snooze button one less time and you won’t have a problem. Plus, could you imagine getting into an accident while applying eyeliner? Ouch!
2. Texting - We’ve always heard how texting is the primary form of distracted driving. This is true but as smartphone usage continues to increase, the issue is broader than texting. Scrolling through social media apps, talking on FaceTime and even watching Netflix 😳 are all equally as common and dangerous as texting. Cell phone usage is six times more likely to cause an accident than drinking and driving. One simple habit to remove the temptation is to put your phone in airplane mode while driving. This completely eliminates the temptation and allows you to be focused.
3. Buzzed driving - While the dangers of drinking while driving have been preached for years, buzzed driving is not as commonly known. The legal limit for your blood alcohol concentration is 0.08%. Instead of trying to compute your body mass and alcohol consumption to squeeze under the legal limit, why not plan ahead and not risk it? Uber and Lyft are readily available and can completely eliminate the potential for a very unpleasant (and expensive) evening.
4. Eating while driving - The definition of distracted driving is any activity that takes your eyes off of the road. You would be hard-pressed to dip your Chick-Fil-A nuggets into your Polynesian sauce while going down I-75 without taking your eyes off of the road. Most of us are so focused on not making a mess while eating and driving that we spend much more time focused (and distracted) with our food than we should be. If you’re on the run and need to hit up a drive-thru, sit in the car for 5 minutes and eat in the parking lot. You won’t make a mess in your car and you’ll be fully focused when you’re back on the road.
Eliminating distractions while driving is one of the easiest ways to prevent accidents. Thousands of lives would be saved every single year if all of us followed this advice.
Distracted Driving Stats from the CDC
42% of high school students who drove in the past 30 days texted while driving.
80% of all accidents are attributed to distracted driving.
400,000 people were injured in an accident caused by distracted driving last year.
3,142 people died last year from distracted driving.
8 people per day die from distracted driving in the U.S.
77% of adults feel confident in their texting and driving abilities. 🙄
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