Nationwide, more Americans are dying in car crashes recently. But that’s not the case in Kansas, reports The Kansas City Star.
From 2014 to 2015, the U.S. saw an increase in traffic fatalities of just over seven percent, the largest year-over-year increase since 1966. But the numbers in the Sunflower State declined at almost the same rate. Kansas highway fatalities fell 7.8 percent from 2014 to 2015.
During the same period, alcohol-impaired-driving fatalities in Kansas fell by over 22 percent.
More than 35,000 people died on U.S. roads in 2015. There were 355 fatalities on Kansas roads, thirty fewer than the previous year. By virtue of comparison, Missouri’s highway fatalities rose by over 13 percent during the one-year period. Half of those killed in passenger vehicles last year weren’t wearing seat belts. One in three road fatalities involved drunken driving or speeding, and One in 10 involved distractions like mobile phones.