States with legal recreational marijuana are not suffering from a higher rate of traffic fatalities, countering claims legalization laws lead to unsafe roadways.
The American Journal of Public Health published a study Thursday finding no meaningful increase in motor vehicle deaths in Colorado and Washington, the first two states to fully legalize marijuana. The researchers compared data from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System between 2009 and 2015 in Colorado and Washington against eight other states and found legalization is having little impact on traffic trends, reports Reuters.
Intense debate surrounds the issue and there is little consensus among experts on what effect legal weed is having on driving. Another study published Thursday tied an increase in auto insurance claims to marijuana legalization.
“Our study focused on deaths and actually found what we expected going into this,” Jason Adedoyte, a trauma surgeon and lead author of the study, told Reuters. “Back in 2012 some argued that people would ride around in their cars, crash and die. Our study proved that isn’t true.”
The opposing study, from the Highway Loss Data Institute, showed collision claims increased by 2.7 percent overall in Colorado, Washington and Oregon compared to nearby states, which researchers tie to full legalization.
Researchers based their findings on comparisons with neighboring states, which resulted in wide ranging outcomes. Colorado showed a 21 percent increase in claims when compared to Utah, but only a 3 percent increase when contrasted with Wyoming.
Marijuana legalization is causing concerns across the U.S. over high driving and how to accurately test drivers for the substance. A urine test, the current measure of whether a driver may be impaired by marijuana, will detect THC, however there is currently no scientific consensus on what level of THC constitutes impaired driving.
Critics oppose these tests, because THC will linger in a person’s system for weeks after use.
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