Linkoping, Sweden: A six-year-old Swedish law prohibiting motorists from operating a vehicle with any detectable level of a controlled substance in the driver’s blood has not reduced incidents of drugged driving, according to data published in the December issue of the journal Traffic Injury Prevention.
“Sweden’s zero-concentration limit has done nothing to reduce DUID [driving under the influence of drugs] or deter the typical offender because recidivism is high in this population of individuals,” the study concludes. “Indeed, many traffic delinquents in Sweden are criminal elements in society with previous convictions for drunk and/or drugged driving as well as other offenses. The spectrum of drugs identified in blood samples from DUID suspects has not changed much since the zero-limit law was introduced.”
Under Swedish law, motorists who drive with trace levels of cannabis or other controlled substances in their blood may face up to two years in prison.
In the US, ten states have enacted so-called “zero tolerance” drugged driving laws, making it a criminal offense for an individual to operate a motor vehicle with any detectable level of a Schedule I substance present in his or her bodily fluids. In six of these states, the law also prohibits motorists from operating a motor vehicle if they have trace levels of non-psychoactive marijuana metabolites in their system. Three states — Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Virginia — have enacted per se drugged driving standards, prohibiting individuals from operating a motor vehicle if they have levels of Schedule I drugs present in their body above a specific threshold. All other states employ an “effect based” standard for DUID, which penalizes motorists only if their observed impairment may be linked to the recent ingestion of a controlled substance.
This past August, the Bush administration approved legislation ordering the Transportation Secretary, in cooperation with National Institutes of Health (NIH), to submit a report to Congress estimating the prevalence of “drugged driving” and assessing the available “technologies for measuring driver impairment resulting from use of the most common illicit drugs (including the use of such drugs in combination with alcohol.)”
For more information, please contact Paul Armentano, NORML Senior Policy analyst, at (202) 483-5500. Full text of the study, “Driving under the influence of drugs in Sweden with zero concentration limits in blood for controlled substances,” appears in the December issue of Traffic Injury Prevention. A comprehensive breakdown of state drugged driving laws appears in NORML’s report, “You Are Going Directly to Jail: DUID Legislation: What It Means, Who’s Behind It, and Strategies to Prevent It,” available online at: http://www.norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=6492