USA Today has a huge front page story today about an increase in vehicular accidents among soldiers, especially among those who have come back from Iraq. The headline blares, “Survivors of war take fatal risks,” above a dramatic photo of a completely trashed Pontiac Trans Am which Iraq war veteran Vicent Withers was driving when he crashed into another car in North Carolina, killing himself and the other driver.
The angle is clear — soldiers back from Iraq are taking ridiculous risks either to get the same rush of adrenalin they experienced in Iraq or because they feel invincible after making it out of a war zone alive.
But the reader has to wade through to the 13th paragraph before the story notes that the rate of fatalities among Army personnel is still lower than the rate of fatalaties among civilians of a similar age group.
Presumably “Survivors of war take fatal risks on roads” is sells more papers than “Army personnel in Iraq drive just as poorly as civilians.” Certainly the military should look into why the rate is increasing, but it doesn’t deserve the alarmist coverage that USA Today gives it.
Its also a bit odd that the USA Today article mentions the Marines accident rate in passing, never giving statistics or comparisons for pre- and post-Iraq war. Reading between the lines, it appears that the reason for this is that the vehicular accident rate for Marines hasn’t been affected by the Iraq war, which undercuts the USA Today thesis about soldiers unable to cope with coming home.
In other words, exactly the sort of statistical hatchet job that USA Today excels at so well.
Source:
Survivors of war take fatal risks on roads. Gregg Zoroya, USA Today, May 3, 2005.