During a June interview, Gov. Kim Reynolds defended her decision to veto a change to Iowa’s medical marijuana laws. The Gazette Fact Checker team has looked further into one of her claims.
The Claim
“Right now, more Americans are killed in drug-impaired traffic crashes than alcohol. It’s switched, from 44 to 38 percent. And a third of Iowa drug-related fatal crashes involve THC.”Source of claim
Iowa Gov. Reynolds made the statements on a June 3 WHO Radio show, “People’s Press Conference,” hosted by Jeff Angelo. She was talking about why she vetoed legislation that would have allowed higher potency for medical marijuana products sold in Iowa.
Advocates for expanding Iowa’s medical marijuana program pushed
to remove the 3 percent cap on THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol, saying the
change would allow patients to get the dosage they need without taking
excessive amounts, which can be expensive. But Reynolds said it was too
much too soon for the program that saw its first sales in December.
She has pointed several times to drug-related
traffic fatality data to bolster her point law enforcement officers have
legitimate concerns about marijuana use.
Analysis
When the Fact Checker asked Reynolds where she got the information about national drug-impaired traffic crashes, she referred us to a report from the Governors Highway Safety Administration. The 40-page report uses data from the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System, an annual census of fatal injuries suffered in vehicle crashes across the country.
The Governors Highway Safety group reports 43.6
percent of drivers in fatal crashes in 2016 with known drug test results
were drug positive. This was up from 27.8 percent in 2006, the group
reported in its analysis. In a similar 10-year analysis, the Governors
Safety group reported 37.9 percent of drivers in fatal crashes in 2016
with known alcohol tests were found positive for alcohol use, down from
41 percent in 2006.
When Reynolds says the drug and alcohol statistics
“switched,” she likely means that when comparing drug-related traffic
fatalities and alcohol-related traffic fatalities, drug-related crashes
made up a larger share in 2016.
But there are some major weaknesses in the data, the
Governors Highway Safety report noted.
First, not all states test
drivers in fatal crashes for the presence of drugs in their bodies.
Testing rates by state vary from 2 percent to 96 percent, and states
test for drugs differently.
Second, the Fatality Analysis Reporting System data
on drug-related fatal crashes includes drivers with any drugs in their
systems — even prescription drugs that don’t impair driving.
And when a driver tests positive for multiple drugs,
there are inconsistent rules across jurisdictions about which drugs
should be included on the forms.
But the biggest caveat in using crash data to
measure how marijuana impairs driving is that there isn’t a standard for
impairment similar to Iowa’s .08 blood alcohol level for drunken
driving. This is according to Tim Brown and Gary Gaffney, lead
investigators on drugged driving studies at the University of Iowa
National Advanced Driving Simulator.
“There is a significant uptick in drugs being on
board, so there is reason to be concerned there are people who have
active drugs in their systems while they’re driving.” Brown said. “The
extent that contributes to crashes is unknown. More research is needed.”
Data about alcohol-impaired crashes long has been
collected and analyzed. These deaths decreased 1.1 percent nationwide
between 2016 and 2017, but still there were 10,874 traffic deaths linked
to alcohol impairment in 2017 and these deaths accounted for 29 percent
of all U.S. traffic fatalities, the U.S. Department of Transportation reported.
The second part of Reynolds’s statement relates to
Iowa traffic deaths, tracked by the Iowa Department of Transportation.
She says one-third of Iowa drug-related fatal crashes involve THC, the
component of marijuana that produces a high.
Iowa had 330 traffic fatalities in 2017, the most recent year for which final data is available.
In those crashes, 77 drivers tested positive for
some drugs in their systems, according to Dennis Kleen, the Iowa DOT’s
Fatality Analysis Reporting System and driver data manager. Of the 77
with drugs in their systems, 39 had some form of THC, he said.
So the share of drug-related traffic deaths
involving THC was 48 percent — which is actually higher than the
one-third Reynolds reported. Her lower number likely was from
preliminary crash data available earlier in the year, Kleen said.
Alcohol still was linked to more traffic fatalities
in Iowa than drugs in 2017. Of the 330 fatal crashes that year, 92 of
the drivers, or 28 percent, had a blood alcohol content of at least .01.
Drivers with drugs in their systems made up 23 percent of the fatal
crashes in 2017.
The same caveats remain about the lack of a standard measure for drug impairment, he said.
Conclusion
Reynolds is right there was an increase in the share of drivers in fatal crashes across the country who tested positive for drugs between 2006 and 2016.
The legalization of marijuana for recreational use
(11 states and District of Columbia) and limited medical use (most other
states) may have played a role in this. However, the United States also
has faced an increase in prescription drug use and an opioid addiction
crisis over the past decade.
Reynolds also is right at least one-third of Iowa’s
drug-related traffic fatalities in 2017 involved drivers with THC in
their systems.
The context missing in her statements is that
there’s not yet a standard way to test drivers for drug impairment, so
experts in the state and federal transportation agencies have warned
against drawing comparisons between drug and alcohol impairment. And, in
Iowa, alcohol-related traffic deaths still outnumber drug-related
traffic deaths.
We give Reynolds a B because while she had the
numbers right about increased drug use among drivers involved in fatal
crashes, conclusions about drug-impaired driving still need more
research.
Criteria
The Fact Checker team checks statements made by an Iowa political candidate/officeholder or a national candidate/officeholder about Iowa, or in ads that appear in our market. Claims must be independently verifiable.
We give statements grades from A to F based on accuracy and context.
If you spot a claim you think needs checking, email us at factchecker@thegazette.com.
l This Fact Checker was researched and written by Erin Jordan of The Gazette.
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