According to the National Sleep Foundation’s 2005 Sleep in America poll, 60% of adult drivers – about 168 million people – say they have driven a vehicle while feeling drowsy in the past year, and more than one-third, (37% or 103 million people), have actually fallen asleep at the wheel!
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration conservatively estimates that 100,000 police-reported crashes are the direct result of driver fatigue each year.
This results in an estimated 1,550 deaths, 71,000 injuries, and $12.5 billion in monetary losses.
According to data from Australia, England, Finland, and other European nations, all of whom have more consistent crash reporting procedures than the U.S., drowsy driving represents 10 to 30 percent of all crashes.
The prevalence of sleep-related crashes varies from country to country. Driver sleepiness has been found the cause of between 1.5% (in the United States) to over 30% (on UK motorways) of crashes,...
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