State must address specific danger of phone use while driving

More than 400 people lost their lives on Iowa roadways last year, a 27 percent increase from 2015. The number marks the end of a four-year downward trend and is the state's largest one-year peak in traffic deaths since 2008.

These statistics combined with Department of Transportation data on all accidents due to distracted driving paint a grim and worsening picture. Phone use while driving is an exceptional risk that must be singled out.

We hope lawmakers will share this epiphany.

Iowa has banned texting and similar activities while driving since 2010. But the crime remains a secondary offense, meaning law enforcement can only stop texting drivers when an additional primary violation is observed, such as speeding.

Law enforcement has repeatedly argued texting should be a primary offense, and certain lawmakers have authored bills to that effect. Other legislators have blocked the measures, characterizing more stringent enforcement of smartphone use as an infringement on personal freedom.

Yet, the freedom to act irresponsibility behind the wheel affects more than individual drivers. Higher crash and fatality rates mean higher insurance rates for us all.

Drivers distracted by a phone or similar device were responsible for 682 crashes in 2005. By 2015, there were 1,100 incidents. We expect, when DOT data is crunched, accidents caused by phone or device distractions will increase again in 2016.

We still believe distracting driving includes far more than phones. But texting, surfing social media and the like is especially dangerous because it requires use of hands, eyes and brain. It isn't just the hand that leaves the wheel to poke on the screen, but the eyes that leave the roadway and mental focus shifting to a device instead of the 3,000-pound metal mass hurling down a roadway.

Phone use is prevalent in society, especially among Iowa's youngest and most inexperienced drivers. Longtime drivers who should arguably know better also haven't embraced warnings.

Lawmakers must join us in singling out phone use as a particular danger and move beyond passive initiatives like awareness campaigns. Increased penalties specific to phone use must be considered. All but hands-free phone use while driving needs to be stigmatized by whatever means necessary.

At the very least, texting while driving should become a primary offense.

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