Safe Speed Forums

They are, in general, not people given to wild guesswork. Add to that their professional expertise in assessing just how badly affected people are - whether from injury, shock, drugs or alcohol - and the theory may not be as wacky as it sounds.

Why are you able to put in one line what I failed to express clearly in lots of lines?

Please don't take me for a fool Robin, that is patently not what I meant.

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Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical, liberal minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.

I don't know. But I do know a line of reasoning that makes perfect sense and ties in with our common knowledge of alcohol and its effects on the human physiology when I see it. And what you are suggesting fits that category; it also dovetails with my own experiences of living in a culture in which drink driving was not as uncommon as it should have been.

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Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical, liberal minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.

Hold on one moment, who's trying to take who for a fool? You accused me of purporting something as fact that was not, and that fact was that anything that makes drivers take more care is a good thing. That was patently what I meant!

Yes, I saw that, but didn't someone else raise some study that you poo-poo'ed?

Are you sure it just doesn't tie in with social prejudices regarding alcohol?

No I didn't accuse you of purporting something as fact, I pointed out that your closing remark, was delivered as if the preceding text were fact.

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Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical, liberal minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.

As sure as I can be.
As sure as my own experiences validate it, yes.

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Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical, liberal minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.

The immediately preceeding text is fact, and it is to that which I was referring.

Depends on your definition of poo-poo'ed.

PeterE quoted a TRL booklet on drink driving. In reply to which I raised the point that the booklet stated that

Which I thought removed some of its credibilty.

Pogo mentioned a scandinavian report which showed no significant difference between blood levels of 80 and 50.
I didn't criticise that one because I haven't read it.

A fair point, for example pre existing urine in the bladder will dilute any alcohol concentration when measured but I have no idea how police measure urine when trying to secure a conviction, if they ever do.

I repeat: when measuring the blood alcohol concentration, after drinking 4 units of alcohol in one sitting, which have been rapidly absorbed metabolism is not relevant when one is assesing whether the drink drive limit has been exeeded or not.

We are talking about varying degrees of 'slow' here, when it comes to alcohol metabolism, everyone metabolises it relatively slowly - virtually no exceptions.

In sensible terms, its best not take 4 units and drive because we know alcohol depresses the central nervous system, however if under scientific conditions I were to drink 4 units of alcohol and then have my BAC measured I would place a substantial bet my alcohol level would never exceed the current limit.

This paper
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entre ... t=Citation
shows a difference in rate of first pass metabolism in non alcoholics varying from 73% to 44%. In alcoholics it went as low as 23%
This varied again when the subjects took the alcohol after fasting. The conclusion of this trial was

Bold added by me.


This paper shows a 2 to 3 fold difference in alcohol metabolism among individuals dependent on liver enzyme levels.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entre ... t=Citation



This paper shows significant differences due to bacterial infection.
http://content.karger.com/ProdukteDB/pr ... kelNr=7508


At this point I am going to give up trying to show you that you are wrong as I am sure its very boring for the non medical scientists.

You're still missing the point - you can quote interesting but irrelevant scientific papers until the cows come home - it won't make them any more relavant and it certainly will not convince anyone.

It comes down to a simple statistical question, namely "Are drivers with a blood alcohol level between 50 and 80 over-represented in accident figures vis-a-vis the population at large?".

If the answer is "yes", then there is good reason for reducing the limit to 50mg. If "no", then all that a reduction to 50mg would achieve is to criminalise more drivers without contributing anything to road safety.

Problem is, are such figures available? If not, then any change in the law will be based upon guesswork and prejudice rather than science... And where have we seen that before???

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"Politicians are the same the world over... We build bridges where there aren't any rivers." - Nikita Kruschev

I don't follow. Are you asserting:


as a fact or suggesting it's a possibility?

If the former, how much alcohol? One unit? two? four? a sip?

I think it is reasonably well known that the perfomance of at least some tasks by at least some people in at least some circumstances is improved by a degree of alcohol consumption. Do you accept that is also true? Or is at least a possibility? In which case, how can that fit with your assertion?

A possibility, supported by anecdotal evidence and experience. I cannot substantiate any of the following and accept the fact that it conveniently demonstrates my suspicion.
In the whole of my working life I can think of only one occurence of a work colleague being involved in a road traffic crash during their normal daily routine, i.e. travelling to or from work.
In that same time I can point to a small handful (5 or 6) of seperate occaisions upon which, having been to a beer call after work and having drunk one or two beers (its usually beers) someone has been involved in an incident during their drive home. Most of these occured overseas (in Germany and Cyprus) where the drink/drive culture was perhaps more deply rooted than back in the UK. One of those was one of my subordinates who was breathalysed, found to be under the limit but was apportioned most of the blame for the incident. There are other incidents where the individual involved swears they were not to blame but were breathalysed and found to be over the limit.
It doesn't prove anything, but it certainly suggests to me that had those individuals stuck to coke the the chances are some wouldn't have been involved in their incident.



I accept that for some indivduals this may be true but, with respect to driving, don't see how useable this information is in real world where other people will be adversely affected.

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Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical, liberal minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.

Remember, the main issue is not whether drinking impairs, or how much or how soon, but whether the level of impairment differs sufficiently (or at all) between 50mg and 80mg to justify changing a law that is already not enforced adequately.