National Safety Month

The National Safety Council has released a campaign focused on helping save lives and preventing injuries. The council acknowledges the myriad of fears we have throughout our everyday lives and strives to provide education on a variety of topics. Their campaign this year, “What I Live For” is meant to share stories, provide resources, videos, tips and infographics to keep ourselves and others safe. While hundreds of topics can be discussed, the campaign has decided to specifically focus on prescription painkiller abuse, transportation safety, ergonomics, emergency preparedness and slips, trips and falls.

At Kaine Law we work to serve our clients with the upmost knowledge and reliability. Therefore, in keeping with this month’s campaign, we thought sharing the “transportation” concerns would be a great way to share information and learn more about the dangers of the road.

The National Safety Council released their marketing materials for Transportation safety and listed the following information as car crashes remains one of the leading causes of unintentional death in the United States. It is estimated that 100 people are killed every day on our roadways.

• Be on the Road, off the Phone
  • Cell phone use – texting or talking on a handheld or hands-free device – is involved in an estimated 26 percent (26%) of all crashes each year.
  • Hands-free is not risk-free, either. Even if your hands are on the wheel and your eyes are on the road, your brain is distracted by the cell phone conversation.

• Get Plenty of Sleep
  • An estimated 1,550 people are killed each year in crashes involving drowsy drivers. You should never get behind the wheel if you are tired or have been taking certain medications.

• Protect Your New Teen Driver
  • Half of all teens will be involved in a car crash before graduating from high school.
  • Practice with your teen every week for approximately 30 minutes on safe driving techniques---even if they have been driving for a couple of years.
  • Limit the number of passengers your teen can have in their vehicle.
  • Limit your teenager’s nighttime driving.

As we have noted before, over 35,000 people are killed each year in traffic accidents. This statistic has remained steady some years and even grown in others. We have seen far too many families walk through our doors that have lost a loved one due to the neglect of other drivers (or other unfortunate circumstances).

Please take a moment and visit www.nsc.org to receive more safety tips to share with your family, coworkers and neighbors. This month is dedicated to safety, so let’s be educated and keep each other safe along the way!

For more information on this article, contact Kaine Law.