CO-SPONSORED BY THE ROAD ACCIDENT FUND
The facts you need to know:
ALCOHOL IS NOT A MITIGATING FACTOR IN ANY ROAD DRINKING AND DRIVING IS A
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LATEST!: Breathalyser Test results have been accepted by Attorney’s General as admissible evidence in court. This means that:
| * | It will be easier for traffic officers to check drivers for drinking and driving as they will no longer need nurses at roadblocks or have to take drivers to hospital to draw a blood sample |
| * | If a driver is breathalysed and found to be over the legal limit, s/he can be taken off the road immediately and could be sentenced within hours. There are no court delays arising from the wait for blood test results |
| * | The introduction of the breathalyser in the UK led to a 300% increase in convictions in its first year of operation |
BOOZE BUSES will be used as a form of roving road block* Booze buses make it possible for road blocks to be set up in minutes; they can be moved to a number of different locations in the span of an evening. * They are equipped with all the equipment necessary for testing whether a driver is drunk – so larger numbers of suspect drivers can be tested and taken off our roads if they over the limit. |
Alcohol is water-soluble and is absorbed in the blood. More blood is supplied to the brain than other organs, with the result that alcohol impairs your brain functions within minutes.
At a breath-alcohol level of 0.38:
Reaction time doubles, muscle co-ordination diminishes and a driver is more likely to respond incorrectly to stimuli
Alcohol affects the forebrain by suppressing caution, carefulness, concentration, self criticism and self control
It is a mood changer, leading to a feeling of well-being and to recklessness, aggression and carelessness, all of which are highly likely to negatively affect judgement
Alcohol affects vision: Depth perception deteriorates, making it impossible to judge accurately how far away objects are. Eye muscles lose their precision and when both eyes can=t focus on the same object, vision becomes blurred or you see double.
Alcohol results in tunnel vision. At night pupils don=t adapt from darkness to light and a drunk driver will be dazzled by oncoming headlights much more severely than a sober driver. Alcohol also makes night blindness worse.
In a Western Cape study, 47% of drivers killed in
crashes had a blood alcohol concentration higher than 0.08 gram per
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If you are caught driving under the influence of alcohol, you do not have the option of paying a fine. You will be arrested on the spot
You will then be taken to a police station where you get booked and locked up in a cell until you are sober
After you have sobered up (which can take hours), you will be charged for driving under the influence of alcohol
If a blood test is being used as evidence, you may apply for bail in a magistrate’s office or court
If you cannot afford bail you will be locked up until the case is heard, usually about two months after being charged
If a breathalyser test is being used as evidence, you will appear in court the next weekday in some jurisdictions.
If your blood alcohol concentration is 0.08 you are four times more likely to crash than if you are sober.
With a count of 0.12, your chances are 15 times more likely and at 0.16 your chances of crashing
are 30 times more than if you're sober.
DRINKING AND DRIVING AND THE LAWUnder the current legislation, the Road Traffic Act: Act 29 of 1989, you are deemed to be driving under the influence if you exceed: blood alcohol: 0,08 gm per 100ml of blood Under a new law, the National Road Traffic Act: 93 of 1996 (which will only become enforceable when it has been passed by all nine provinces), the levels for any person other than a professional driver will be: blood alcohol: 0,05 gram per 100 ml of blood For professional drivers (of goods vehicles exceeding a mass of 3,5 tonne and drivers of vehicles carrying passengers for reward) the levels will be: blood alcohol: 0,02 gm per 100 ml of blood
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