National Road Safety Council Programme Coordinator Victor Anderson says while there is a dire need for more breathalyser devices to be distributed to cops, given the spike being seen in road traffic crashes, the combined effect of several initiatives now in train will eventually result in “some reduction in the number of fatalities”.

According to data from the Island Traffic Authority (ITA), as of May 12 this year, 142 lives have been lost to road crashes from 128 fatal collisions. It said during the first quarter (January–March), Jamaica recorded 94 road fatalities resulting from 85 fatal crashes; the most affected groups being motorcyclists, private motor vehicle drivers, and pedestrians; with motor cyclists accounting for 28 per cent of fatalities, private vehicle drivers 26 per cent, and pedestrians 21 per cent.

The ITA said four parishes — St Catherine (15 per cent), St Andrew (13 per cent), St James (13 per cent), and Westmoreland (10 per cent) — contributed to more than half (51 per cent) of total road fatalities for the first quarter.

Appearing at this week’s Jamaica Monday Exchange alongside ITA officials, Anderson said a recent donation of breathalysers and screening equipment to cops will create a marginal difference.

“One of the things — and it’s a relatively small thing at the moment — we’ve managed to get some money from the United Nations Road Safety Fund, and part of those funds were used to produce breathalyser equipment for the police, so they have been equipped with some additional breathalysers. They need far more, though, and that’s why I said it was a fairly modest change in their resources,” Anderson told Observer editors and reporters.

“There is also improvement in the type of equipment because right now they have a screening device they use on the road and if this screening device shows that you are above the breath alcohol level, they have to take you to a police station and use another machine to print out an evidence report that they can take to court, because that offence has to be dealt with in court. There are some new devices they have just been given which allow them to do everything in the field — test, do the evidence report as well, and they have two of those devices,” the programme coordinator said.

He however noted that the two were by no means sufficient.

“They need probably about 20 or 30 more to really equip [them]. They have actually asked for 40, the police have put in their procurement requests for those devices; I don’t know when they are going to get it,” Anderson admitted.

He, in the meantime, said observational studies, which will be part of a United Nations Road Safety Fund Project in which Jamaica is a participant, should help drive the numbers down.

“People will be stopped for speeding, and one of the reasons for speeding is alcohol, so the police will test for alcohol use and results will be published and hopefully that study will get underway shortly. These are the kinds of things that are going to be done, the results will be published so that people will know what is happening and hopefully all of these things coming together, we will see some reduction in the number of fatalities,” Anderson said.

Last November, following the publication of a Ministry of Heath snapshot study of drug use among Jamaicans which revealed “clear indications of increases in substance use over the past seven years”, vice-chairman of the National Road Safety Council (NRSC) Dr Lucien Jones said the entity was ramping up the breathalyser programme and searching for a tool to test motorists for marijuana use.

The study flagged alcohol prevalence rates for all 14 parishes, singling out the parishes of Trelawny, St Ann, and Kingston for outstripping the national prevalence rate which, at the time, stood at 46.2 per cent.

In relation to driving under the influence of alcohol, the study said that had increased since 2016 from 14.4 per cent to 17.5 per cent.

Health and Wellness Minister Dr Christopher Tufton, in unveiling the findings during a press briefing in the Corporate Area at the time, had said the surge was “most notable” in the four per cent increase last year in alcohol use (56 per cent to 60 per cent) as well as in the current year (42 per cent to 46 per cent), and the same level of increase last year in the use of cigarettes (12.7 per cent to 16.8 per cent).

According to the health minister, harmful use of alcohol is most evident among the 25-35 age group while current ganja use is most prevalent among the 18-25 age group. Tufton said, among those who smoke cigarettes, daily use increased from seven per cent in 2016 to 11.6 per cent at present.

Speaking with the Sunday Observer then, Dr Jones said: “It’s a challenge that we have for some time; the data that you get internationally is that 30 per cent of drivers who are involved in fatal crashes were found to have been indulging in alcohol. We believe the same thing is happening in Jamaica.”

The legal limit in Jamaica is 35 micrograms of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath, or a blood-alcohol level of 80 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millimetres of blood, with breathalyser machines used to detect the levels.

Jones, in the meantime, said the NRSC is working with the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) to strengthen the breathalyser system.

“We have two challenges, one is the breathalyser programme which we are trying to improve through our own efforts. We have received funds from the United Nations Road Safety Fund, through PAHO, and those funds, or a portion of it, are being used to build up the breathalyser system so we can become effective in testing drivers whether or not they are using alcohol,” Jones told the Sunday Observer at the time.

“Coupled with that issue also is the need for us to be testing people who are driving under the influence of marijuana. The data is quite clear, showing that a significant number of drivers, motorcycle riders admitted to using marijuana and also drinking alcohol shortly before crashing. That data is available to us,” Jones said.