control states, only New Hampshire had this law. The license revocation laws have been associated with a 5% decrease in fatal crashes, and the authors admit that the revocation laws restricted their ability to separate its effect with that of the 0.08% law.In conclusion, the authors said, "The results of this study suggest that 0.08% laws, particularly in combination with administrative license revocation, reduce the proportion of fatal crashes involving drivers and fatally injured drivers with blood alcohol levels of 0.08% or higher and 0.15% or higher."After publication of the study, public safety activists called on legislators in the District of Columbia and the 36 states without the 0.08% threshold to lower their legal blood-alcohol limit. The U.S. "is lagging behind most other industrialized nations. . .that have already lowered their limits to 0.08," said Mothers Against Drunk Driving President Katherine Prescott at a news conference on September 20 at the National Press Club in Washington. Prescott said that activists would use the study to pressure state legislatures and Congress to reexamine drunk driving laws (Brian Mooar, "Public Safety Activists Cite New Study In Urging Lower Blood-Alcohol Limit." Washington Post, September 21, 1996, p. B5).Critics complain that lowering the threshold to 0.08% would be expensive and inefficient. "0.08% doesn't solve what is the real drunk driving problem: In 93% of fatal accidents, the driver was 0.10 and above, and almost half of that percentage is at 0.20 and above," said Jeff Becker, a vice president at the Beer Institute. Brian O'Neill, president of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, said his group does not oppose lowering the threshold but would rather see resources directed toward enforcing existing drunken driving laws....
