What Do the Words "National Highway Traffic Safety Administration" Mean to You?

It seems to me that "National Highway Traffic Safety Administration" should mean, an agency that investigates issues relating to safety on the nation's highways. But apparently not.

Or at least, "not if the downside risk is annoying Congressional appropriations committees."

A page-one article by Matt Richtel in today's New York Times reports that NHTSA sat on the increasing body of research that multitasking drivers are distracted drivers, and that distracted drivers are dangerous drivers (and hands-free or hand-held doesn't make a difference).

Richtel writes, "The former head of the highway safety agency said he was urged to withhold the research to avoid antagonizing members of Congress who had warned the agency to stick to its mission of gathering safety data but not to lobby states."

The research is being made public by the Center for Auto Safety and by Public Citizen, which filed Freedom of Information suits to obtain the material, and then provided it to the Times.

According to Richtel's article, "The researchers [at NHTSA] also shelved a draft letter they had prepared for Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta to send, warning states that hands-free laws might not solve the problem. That letter said that hands-free headsets did not eliminate the serious accident risk. The reason: a cellphone conversation itself, not just holding the phone, takes drivers' focus off the road, studies showed. The research mirrors other studies about the dangers of multitasking behind the wheel. Research shows that motorists talking on a phone are four times as likely to crash as other drivers, and are as likely to cause an accident as someone with a .08 blood alcohol content."

Now, does that sound like "lobbying" to you? To me, it sounds like important findings that ought to be shared as widely as possible. It's especially important because human beings are lousy at estimating their own skill level, and the effect of distractions on their concentration.

I've had people tell me, "I've had a cellphone for 20 years and have talked and driven all that time, and never had an accident," as though that were proof that all this fancy "research" is wrong. But when I ask, "And how would you know that your record isn't due to the swift reflexes of the drivers around you?", all they can do is splutter.

This story makes me angry, not just because important research, research that could have saved lives, was withheld from the public, but because of the stunning ethical failure on the part of an agency that is responsible for public safety, and responsible to the public. "Cover my ass", if I need to remind anyone, is not a sound personal ethic.