A crucial difference between a reduction in overall traffic for fatalities from crash avoidance and and an identical reduction from occupant protection is that when the crashes avoided, all harm is prevented. In the occupant protection case, the prevented fatality is almost certainly converted to a different level of injury, generally a severe injury. Mentioning behavioral factors in some circles can still lead to a charge that you are "blaming the victim". One development that has helped to discredit this once fashionable line of irrationality is the spread of AIDS, which almost everyone agrees can be arrested by behavior changes. It is try to affirm that a passive solution such as adding a drug to the water supply would be preferable. It is similarly try to affirm that passive solutions to traffic losses or preferable to behavioral solutions without regard to whether such solutions exist or can be feasibly developed. The support of the Hingson et al study in this issue confirms an increasing acceptance that we must technically evaluate countermeasures, and favor those that are estimated to reduce the most harm in the most acceptable manner.
Language: en
LA - en SN - 0090-0036 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.86.6.784 ID - ref1 ER -