THE BACS OF DRINKING AND DRIVING

[Music] in the cartoon world ready the cat and mouse chase is a popular form of entertainment action of course the cat is never supposed to actually catch the mouse that would be tragic and cartoons are supposed to be harmless fun [Music] no one is ever killed or injured at least not for long so for your entertainment the ned and ed show cut that's all for today folks [Music] i'm tired cat and mouse chasing his hard work you can say that again cheers i'm feeling better already me too it always seems to hit me faster on an empty stomach [Music] you slammed that door on me pretty hard sorry it didn't hurt you did i nah feeling no pain there was an old barfly named lou who claimed he had drunk just a few yes go on but after he crashed they found he was smashed so they knew lou had more than a few how sad it was supposed to be funny but wasn't he killed who lou true but why be sad about it because no one's supposed to get killed in a cartoon oh who cares about an old barfly who'd been drinking too much to be driving we know when to take it or leave it alone [Music] another well maybe just one for the road [Music] can you drive okay of course i'm feeling great you sure now see ya [Music] [Music] most drinking drivers don't realize when they are unfit to drive because alcohol gives them a false sense of well-being they can believe they are driving well when they [Music] alcohol not only affects your driving judgment but also your judgment of how alcohol affects you how are you doing fine you don't have to check up on me [Music] wake up ed ed are you dead ed this is a cartoon silly nobody dies in a cartoon how many drinks have you had mister why officer i only had one uh maybe just a few well we can check that out easily enough well it's too long come back here blow harder okay your breath alcohol concentration is 0.12 is that bad yes in this state if your alcohol level exceeds 0.10 you're legally intoxicated we're booking you for driving while intoxicated okay sir you're next your bac be what your breath alcohol concentration it's 0.06 though you're not legally drunk you are too impaired to drive you'll have to sleep it off here unless you can call someone to come drive you home hey we match drink for drink but his breath uh be ac yeah well his is higher than mine why the effects of alcohol and individuals can vary perhaps it's because your body weight is greater [Music] fred ed of the famous cartoon team ned and ed was jailed last night after smashing his car into a tree when arrested ed admitted to having a few a breath test established that he was legally drunk his partner ned turned up also yes fx just so now what the idol of 60 million people is a jailbird we can get him out okay fx it's his first offense so they'll probably find him and suspend his driver's license and then what all this bad publicity is gonna hurt us at the box office how about letting ned catch ed in the next film hold a really big farewell party for ed then hire us a new mouse or maybe a dog to chase ned no way ed and i stay together got a better idea yeah i got it ed and i make a public apology then announce we volunteered to make a movie what kind of movie to explain why people who drink should think before driving we'll tell them about bacs and all that a cartoon that's a serious subject people like cartoons and it'll turn those ugly headlines around fx all right quiet please camera ready ready start reading on action ned [Music] roland action over the years there have been many research studies done to find how alcohol affects our ability to drive x-ray lens please because water is the main component in our bodies and alcohol mixes quickly and completely with water it's directly absorbed into the bloodstream without being digested absorption can be slowed down somewhat by food in your stomach but within 20 to 30 minutes the bloodstream is circulating the alcohol you consumed throughout your body its action on the brain is immediate apparently by interfering with the oxygen supply to the brain cells the greater the alcohol concentration the more your brain's activity is slowed down or impaired and the greater the effects on your behavior zoom lens please the amount of alcohol in your system can be measured simply and accurately from blood urine or breath and then related to the impairment of your driving ability measurements made from blood specimens are called blood alcohol concentration measurements made by breath tests which are now widely used in law enforcement are called breath alcohol concentration both measurements are known as bac and are expressed as a simple percentage for instance if you weigh 150 pounds 0.02 percent would probably be your breath concentration when your body has absorbed the alcohol from one typical drink such as 12 ounces of beer one and a half ounces of 80 proof whiskey or a 5 ounce glass of table wine if this were your first drink your bac curve rises rapidly from 0 to 0.02 percent as the alcohol is absorbed then it starts to drop slowly as your body burns off or eliminates the alcohol for ed who's quite small one drink would produce a higher bac and a 220 pound person would have a lower bac but whatever your weight your body's burn-off rate is about 0.015 percent an hour if you weigh 150 pounds it would take your body a little over one hour to eliminate the alcohol from that one drink drinking more than one drink in an hour would increase your bac and extend the time required to lower it your bac is the result of your body weight your rate of alcohol consumption and the time that has elapsed to give your body the opportunity to burn it off the only effective remedy for intoxication is time an hour or so for each .015 percent of breath alcohol concentration to eliminate the effects drinking coffee taking cold showers or physical exertion can make a sleepy drunk a wide awake drunk but won't speed up your alcohol elimination rate cut okay ed get ready for the driving simulator test how do you feel about driving great bet i'll surprise you all you're legally too drunk to drive pish-tosh okay professor let's try a rehearsal a dangerous side effect to alcohol is its ability to make you feel completely able to handle a car right on professor give her a chance when you actually may be incapable of driving and a public menace that's why we conduct under the influence driving tests here in the lab it would be too dangerous in actual traffic thanks i could use one for the road to simulate this is for me i'm being tested after you ed take your place for rehearsal coming the subject sits here uh just doing one of my cartoon falls this is a cartoon version of an actual driving simulation research test with a steering wheel and an accelerator pedal linked to a film projector projector on please our driving simulator is a means of measuring a driver's level of competence because actual driving is a difficult task requiring alertness mental concentration and an ability to make quick correct decisions situations are introduced that require instant responses and quick decisions reaction time is measured peripheral vision is tested comparisons can be made of behavior when sober versus when under the influence that counts as a crash ed though individuals differ in the degree to which they are affected by a given amount of alcohol our research indicated that there is a universal pattern of driving impairment related to alcohol concentration in the body as our alcohol concentration rises brain functions are depressed we become less responsible less alert and less able to control our reflexes while it becomes more and more difficult to make quick decisions 0.05 is considered the danger level for most drivers and sufficient cause to be arrested in some states even though you may be feeling good your driving won't be and what's worse you won't realize it regardless of individual differences as our bac approaches 0.08 we all suffer an obvious loss of driving competence okay professor now let's figure out what you'll say about those accident charts all right this chart summarizes 18 different studies made in cooperation with law enforcement agencies while legally intoxicated drivers were found to be a very small percentage of all drivers on the road they were five times more likely to be involved in an injury or property damaging crash a quarter to one half of all drivers in multi-car fatal injury crashes were found to be legally drunk as were nearly two-thirds of the drivers killed in single vehicle crashes these are often called mystery crashes because no one survives to tell what happened how sad this doesn't mean that all these crashes were caused by alcohol but it does mean that alcohol use does correlate with greatly increased crash risk what are the odds they're on the next chart the higher your bac the greater the gamble you are twice as likely to have a fatal crash if your bac is .06 percent then if you've not been drinking at 0.10 percent your chances of a fatal crash are six to eight times greater and over 20 times greater with a bac of 0.15 drinking does seem to go together with crashes and deaths okay professor i don't know if that death stuff is good cartoon material but uh let's sleep on it and uh pick it up from here tomorrow we're ready now no ed looks hungover that's all for today folks how are you feeling sad very sad come on i'll drive you home maybe we should take a taxi you don't like the way i drive sure but the whole purpose of this film hey okay you call a cab while i show you how good a driver i am see nothing to it but you're just steering you don't have the flashing lights and other stuff on there it's easy the taxi will be here in half an hour what i got company coming for dinner best they could do let's wait for the cab now why i can drive okay if we both have to drink for tomorrow's shooting we better ask someone to drive us home [Music] ned you all right nobody dies in a cartoon but we haven't finished the film yet ned we're like everyone else ned a couple of drinks and common sense goes right out the window