The Okinawa Prefectural Police announced that the number of people apprehended for drinking and driving this year totaled 781 cases at the end of August.

This means that about 100 violators are charged every month on average. Prefecture Police officials blame the situation on the culture of “local drivers lacking consciousness of guilt.”

Drinking and driving was the reason in seven out of total 26 cases of fatal accidents, while accidents involving drinking and driving resulting in physical injury numbered 73 cases out of 4,077. That is 3.7 and 2.3 times higher than the national average respectively.  During the past 10 years, Okinawa has constantly had the dubious honor of being the worst in Japan in both types of accidents per 1,000 population.

The number of arrests for drinking and driving is in the fourth place with 1,388 cases following Osaka, Aichi and Tokyo, all of which have many times the population of Okinawa.

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