The European Parliament has introduced a bill to effectively ban alcohol while driving. At present, in many Member States (including the Netherlands) you are still allowed to have a limited blood alcohol level in your blood while driving. The EU wants the limit at zero per mille.
The European Union wants to significantly improve road safety in its member states and is even striving for a highway system in which there are no longer any fatalities or serious injuries. Alcohol also plays an important role in this. In 2019, 23,000 people died in road accidents in the European Union, according to the European Parliament. A significant proportion of those road deaths are caused by alcohol in traffic, the German newsmagazine reported of the mirror. This week, MEPs in Strasbourg demanded that EU countries step up their road safety efforts. This also includes a 0 per mille limit for alcohol in traffic.
In the Netherlands, the number of fatalities caused by alcohol in traffic is a point of constant attention. According to police figures In 2016 there were still 13 road deaths due to alcohol, in 2018 there were 36. In 2019, 29 people died in traffic accidents in which alcohol played a role in the first nine months. According to the Road Safety Research Foundation (SWOV), the actual number of road deaths due to alcohol is higher than the figures from the police show. This is because the blood alcohol level of killed road users is often not measured, because they can no longer be legally prosecuted, according to SWOV. About two thirds of all serious alcohol accidents are caused by a relatively small group of serious alcohol offenders. It is estimated that there are between 90,000 and 125,000 offenders.
Current limit
The Netherlands is one of the EU countries where you can still get behind the wheel with a little alcohol. The limit here is 0.2 per mille for novice drivers and 0.5 per mille for drivers who have had their driving license for five years or longer. In practice, 0.5 per mille in men equates to approximately two glasses of alcoholic drink in an hour. In women it is slightly less. In the Czech Republic and Hungary, among others, 0 per mille already applies as a limit.
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl