Do I want to be remembered as the person who was in an accident because I was texting and driving, Killing myself and the people in the car with me? I know I don’t! Texting isn’t just dangerous for you but for the people around you also. So I am going to talk about the dangers of texting and driving.

The risk of a car accident increases by fifty percent for people who text while they are driving says Donald Lewis, MD, chief of Eastern Virginia Medical School’s department of pediatrics and co-researcher. Researchers at Eastern Virginia Medical School enlisted 21 teens between the ages sixteen and eighteen to take part in a series of simulated driving experiments. When the teens where distracted by a device requiring finger movement they steered the virtual vehicles erratically, weaving in and out of lanes and running over virtual people. Their driving was way worse when texting probably because texting forces people to look down in addition to moving their fingers says Donald Lewis.

Sending or receiving a text message takes a drivers eye of the road for an average of 4.6 seconds. At 55 mph, it equals the length of driving an entire football field blind says Jennifer Horning, State Farm Insurance public affairs specialist. Jennifer Horning held workshop on the dangers of texting and driving. Students were given the opportunity to see how well they could text and drive during Horning’s workshop. The students used a Wii video game system to race while friends in class sent them text messages. While trying not to crash, they had to answer to the text messages. Kyleigh Waymen of Athens said she never knew crashes could be that bad and cause that much damage.

It is unfair for families to have to deal with their child being dead because of a distracted driver. The harm that it can cause to me and the people around me is not worth it. That message that I feel the need to send can wait. Do the right thing, don’t text and drive!