In 2008 Brazil enacted Law n° 11.705, known as the Lei Seca (in Portuguese) or Dry Law, altering the National Traffic Code by establishing zero tolerance for the presence of alcohol in drivers' bloodstreams and toughening punishment for offenders. In 2012 the New Dry Law, Law n° 12.760 came into force in an effort to correct for legal loopholes in the earlier version and make it feasible to produce alternative forms of proof of alcohol impediment against those drivers who refused to take the breath analysis test. Sanctions for offenders were made even more severe. Ten years after the advent of the first Lei Seca this study set out to make a quantitative assessment of the two laws' impacts regarding the reduction of lethal traffic accidents in the Federal District, Brazil. Intervention Analysis of Time Series was the technique used and transfer functions enabled the incorporation of the effects of dummy exogenous variables to the Box and Jenkins ARIMA model. Results showed that while Law n° 11.705 had no significant impact, Law 12.760 did have a statistically significant impact in reducing lethal accidents. Such results underscore the need for ex post monitoring and evaluation of Laws and confirm the premise that legislation only successfully produces its effects when compliance can be enforced.
Keywords: ARIMA models; Control of alcohol consumption by drivers; Intervention analysis; Traffic accidents.
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