SOBERCHECK: an affordable personal breathalyser

The Sober Check is an incredibly powerful education device!

There was another aspect to all this which we hadn't encountered before too - waving the Sober Check in front of someone gives you a license to ask them how many drinks they've had.

At least half the people in our local did not accurately know how many drinks they'd had by 9pm on Friday evening and those that did could not equate them with "standard drinks".

Given that most of those who tried the Sober Check during our trials were well past the age of 18 and the device offered fairly conclusive proof that their perceptions regarding alcohol levels were largely incorrect, it gives rise to possibility of revisiting society's alcohol education procedures. There is no doubt that as an adult, you will develop some form of relationship to alcohol - it may be aversion, it may be occassional use, and it is

At under US$150, the Sober Check is not just affordable to the individual - it is also now within the reach of schools and places where alcohol is served or sold.

The advent of new affordable and widely available technology to measure the levels of intoxication could save hundreds of lives every year if it were incorporated into a comprehensive rethink of the education system.

Spending US$150 is an investment in ensuring you are never charged with a drink driving conviction. To a politician, such an incident might ruin their career. To others it might be just the inconvenience of a missing license for a few years. Yet the risk-taking continues in epic proportions.

We’ve used Australian statistics as they are more moderate than some extreme instances and the stats are consistent and have depth. The average Australian consumes 7.8 litres of pure alcohol per year, giving the nation a top 20 world ranking for alcohol consumption per capita. Over 80% of Aussies consume alcohol on a regular basis, with 11% of males and 6% of females drinking daily and one third of all drinkers consuming alcohol at hazardous or harmful levels according to the Australian Institute of Criminology.

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