Group pushes for mandatory car breathalysers
By Andy Riga
Montreal Gazette
June 7, 2007

MONTREAL -- No, you won't have to put your lips together and blow before you can start your engine.

Instead, Quebec public-health officials say passive technology that detects alcohol in the air should be installed in all new cars to curb drunk driving, responsible for about 40 per cent of road deaths in Quebec.

Problem is, such technology doesn't work well enough yet.

"We're suggesting a passive system where the driver doesn't have to do anything but the alcohol can be detected," said Diane Sergerie of a Quebec public health group.
"Passive technology like that can be very effective -- look at air bags."

The institute is urging a Quebec committee looking at how to reduce Quebec's high road-accident death rate to ask Transport Canada to study the technology and eventually make it mandatory in new vehicles.

Last year, 717 people died on Quebec roads. Compared proportionally to France, the province should have 375 deaths. Compared to Ontario, it should have 500, De Koninck said.

After 18 months of study, the committee on road safety, will make its findings public this month.

Committee head Jean-Marie De Koninck said passive alcohol-testing technology is promising but not ready yet. Sweden had planned to make it mandatory in new cars as of 2010 but had to push the deadline back to 2012.

"The problem at the moment is it detects alcohol anywhere in the car," said De Koninck, a university professor and founder of the Nez Rouge drive-a-drunk home program. "Somebody in the back seat can set it off."

He said researchers are looking at ways to limit the testing to the air around the driver.

Other technologies are also in the offing, including sensors that detect drunkenness by measuring eye movement and the sweat on drivers' fingers.

Paul Boase, a Transport Canada researcher, said the federal government is involved in an international study of passive alcohol-testing technology.

"It's still a long way down the road," he said. "It has to have extremely high reliability because if it's not working people won't tolerate it. We don't have that yet but we're working towards it."

De Koninck said the idea of forcing all new cars to include a gadget into which drivers would have to blow would never fly. "No society would stand for it," he said. "It would mean everybody would be presumed guilty before they can start their car."

Some convicted drunk drivers in Quebec already blow into such systems.

Known as ignition interlock devices, they measure the amount of alcohol on a driver's breath, then lock the ignition if too much is detected. The instruments cost $1,000 each and can be set to require drivers to pull over occasionally to be re-tested.

Convicted drunk drivers in Quebec can apply to use one in order to reduce the length of their license suspension.

Marie Claude Morin, a spokesperson for Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said passive alcohol testing will one day save lives by keeping the inebriated off the road.

In the meantime, she said, Quebec should lower the legal blood-alcohol limit and introduce graduated drivers' licenses that impose restrictions on young drivers, such as curfews.

Last year, 717 people died on Quebec roads. Compared proportionally to France, the province should have 375 deaths. Compared to Ontario, it should have 500, De Koninck said.

Also see...

Technology Partnership for Preventing Deaths and Injuries on Canadian Roads