This week, a highway safety advocacy group released a report grading all states on their traffic laws. The grading was based on the adoption of 15 basic traffic safety laws intended to curb motor vehicle accidents. Florida received a "yellow" ranking, meaning that the organization feels its laws need improvement.

Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety said the 15 models laws are all based upon recommendations from the National Transportation Safety Board. A few issues the model laws address are seat belt and child seat usage, drunk driving, teen driving and texting while driving.

The ninth annual report, titled 2012 Roadmap to State Highway Safety Laws, concluded that an additional 348 new laws need to be adopted nationally for all 15 model laws to be met in every state. The Advocates said that in 2011, 13 states enacted one or more of the recommended laws.

According to the Advocates, better highway safety laws would benefit everyone. It said motor vehicle crashes are estimated to cost society $230 billion every year. More importantly, in 2010, 33,000 people were killed in car accidents throughout the nation and another 2 million people were injured.

Drunk driving is one area in which many states could improve their laws, the president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving said. She said drunk drivers cost the United States $132 billion annually, not to mention the innocent lives that are lost.

"Effective laws like ignition interlock for all convicted drunk drivers will save lives and save money for states. With the technology at hand there is no excuse for states to delay enacting this lifesaving law," she said.

In Florida, some drivers convicted of DUI are required to install an ignition interlock device on their vehicles. However, this only applies to offenders who have prior DUI offenses, a BAC level over a certain limit or there was minor child in the vehicle at the time of the offense.

Source: The Sacramento Bee, "2012 Roadmap to State Highway Safety Laws Shows Fiscal Impact of Highway Safety Gaps," Advocates for Highway Safety and Auto Safety, Jan. 11, 2012