To help enhance passenger vehicle safety, U.S. Sens. Deb Fischer (R-NE) and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) on May 9 offered a bipartisan bill that would update U.S. crashworthiness testing procedures.
“Women are 73 percent more likely to be seriously injured in auto crashes than men, but that doesn’t have to be the case,” Sen. Fischer said. “Our bill will update crash test dummy standards to save thousands of lives and prevent thousands more serious injuries each year.”
Sen. Fischer sponsored the She Develops Regulations In Vehicle Equality and Safety Act, S. 4299, also known as the She DRIVES Act. The bill has three original cosponsors, including Sen. Blackburn and U.S. Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), and aims to improve passenger vehicle safety by requiring the use of advanced testing devices — including a female crash test dummy, according to a bill summary provided by the lawmakers.
According to multiple studies, women die and are seriously injured at much higher rates than men in crashes. For instance, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reports that 1,300 women die every year who would have otherwise lived if female death and injury rates were comparable to that of males, states the summary.
“Women make up more than half the population so it’s ridiculous that we are still doing crash tests with male dummies that can’t give us accurate information about how women would fare in the event of a dangerous car crash,” said Sen. Murray, the bill’s lead original cosponsor. “This is just one example of how the default male bias has real and deadly consequences.”
If enacted, S. 4299 would update crashworthiness testing procedures under NHTSA’s New Car Assessment Program, and would establish injury criteria based on real-world data and introduce specific crashworthiness tests for female occupants in both front and rear seating positions, the summary says.
“Conventional crash testing in the United States has never used female dummies appropriately,” Sen. Blackburn said. “For the first time in over 60 years, this legislation will finally ensure that women are represented in crash testing, and it will prevent avoidable tragedies. We must pass this legislation immediately to keep our mothers and daughters safe on the road.”
Drive US Forward and VERITY Now endorsed S. 4299, which has been referred to the U.S. Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee for consideration.