U.S. Withheld Data on Dangers of Distracted Driving

A student talks on a hands-free cell phone while operating a high-tech driving simulator during a University of Utah study. The upshot: Motorists who talk on cell phones while driving are as impaired as drunken drivers with blood-alcohol levels at the legal limit of 0.08 percent. Credit: Jim Moulin, University of Utah

We've reported previously on studies going back to 2005 that found driving while talking on a cell phone is dangerous. One of the studies found it's as risky as driving while drunk. Driving while texting has also been shown to be very dangerous.

Yet only a handful of states have passed laws banning driving while talking on cell phones or texting.

Now The New York Times reports that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration "decided not to make public hundreds of pages of research and warnings about the use of phones by drivers — in part, officials say, because of concerns about angering Congress." Seems Congress didn't want the agency lobbying states.

“We’re looking at a problem that could be as bad as drunk driving, and the government has covered it up,” Clarence Ditlow, director of the Center for Auto Safety, is quoted as saying by the Times.

In January, The National Safety Council called on state and federal lawmakers to ban the use of cell phones and text-messaging devices while driving and also urged businesses to prohibit it. In an online, self-selecting (non-scientific) poll, 67 percent of LiveScience readers (as of this writing) said lawmakers should institute such laws.