Finland marks 100 years of drunk driving laws

Drunk driving has been a criminal offense in Finland for exactly a century, Yle reports.

Early enforcement relied on observational assessments of a driver’s intoxication. In 1977, Finland introduced precise blood alcohol limits, setting the threshold for basic drunk driving at 0.5 per mille. The limit for aggravated drunk driving was initially 1.5 per mille but has since been lowered to 1.2 per mille.

According to the Finnish Road Safety Council (Liikenneturva), nearly 60 people die annually in drunk driving accidents. Since the 2000s, cases involving a combination of alcohol and drugs have become more common.