The purpose of the study was to relate the mortality of traffic accidents to the blood-alcohol level, in Rio de Janeiro City, in Brazil, between December 2001 and February 2002. The files of 267 victims of traffic accidents were obtained from the from Medical Legal Institute in Rio de Janeiro. It was observed that the mortality was greater for people in their early productive life. Only 88 victims (32% of the total) were submitted to blood-alcohol testing, which revealed that 33% of them tested positive (above 0.6% g/l of alcohol in the blood), and 67% tested negative. Correlating the positive results of the blood-alcohol test with the location of death, it was noted that of 42.2% died in a public street while 16.6% died in a hospital. A significant percentage of the drivers who struck pedestrians with their cars, collided with other cars, or fell from motorcycles test positive for alcohol. An increase in the number of accidents during weekends and holidays was also noticed. The research showed that 70.9% of the victims presented blood-alcohol levels between 1.0 and 2.0 g/l, which links alcohol abuse to traffic accidents.
Blood-alcohol; Mortality; Traffic accidents
