The year 2015 was the first on record in which drug impairment contributed to more vehicular deaths than alcohol impairment, reports The Washington Post. Among the involved drivers tested for drugs or alcohol in 2015, 43 percent had drugs in their system, compared to 37 percent who tested positive for alcohol, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA).
These findings have lawmakers in California, and across the nation, scrambling to reconcile loosening drug laws and America’s opioid epidemic with efforts to reduce drugged driving deaths.