According to the results of a new study, unvaccinated drivers are more likely to be involved in traffic accidents, which would need higher insurance premiums.

New research published in The American Journal of Medicine argues that non-vaccinated individuals should be punished.

According to the study, persons who decline the Covid immunization are more prone to disobey fundamental road safety norms.

In light of the findings, the author of the study suggests that insurance firms should boost premiums for unvaccinated drivers.

“The findings are significant enough that primary care doctors should consider counseling unvaccinated patients on traffic safety—and insurance companies might base changes to insurance policies on vaccination data, the authors suggest,” Fortune magazine reports.

If you passed on getting the COVID vaccine, you might be a lot more likely to get into a car crash.

Or at least those are the findings of a new study published this month in The American Journal of Medicine. During the summer of 2021, Canadian researchers examined the encrypted government-held records of more than 11 million adults, 16% of whom hadn’t received the COVID vaccine.

They found that the unvaccinated people were 72% more likely to be involved in a severe traffic crash—in which at least one person was transported to the hospital—than those who were vaccinated. That’s similar to the increased risk of car crashes for people with sleep apnea, though only about half that of people who abuse alcohol, researchers found.

The excess risk of car crash posed by unvaccinated drivers “exceeds the safety gains from modern automobile engineering advances and also imposes risks on other road users,” the authors wrote.

Of course, skipping a COVID vaccine does not mean that someone will get into a car crash. Instead, the authors theorize that people who resist public health recommendations might also “neglect basic road safety guidelines.”

What would cause them to ignore the traffic laws? According to the authors, there are numerous potential causes, including mistrust of government, a belief in freedom, misconceptions regarding daily risks, “faith in natural protection,” “hostility toward regulation,” economic hardship, misleading information, a lack of resources, and personal values.

Since unvaccinated motorists are more likely to be engaged in traffic collisions than vaccinated motorists, first responders may wish to take precautions against COVID during traffic accidents, according to the authors.

More on this story via The Republic Brief:

“The findings suggest that unvaccinated adults need to be careful indoors with other people and outside with surrounding traffic,” the authors posited.

There has been an online backlash against the study after it concluded that COVID vaccination hesitancy is related to increased traffic accidents. CONTINUE READING…