WASHINGTON — Alcohol-related traffic death rates increased or held steady in 19 states between 1998 and 2002, according to new federal data suggesting that efforts to curb drunken driving have reached a plateau.

In Washington state the death rate declined 10 percent during those years.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s report, which was being released today, calculated the fatality rate per 100 million miles driven. NHTSA considers a crash alcohol-related if a driver had anything above a 0.01 blood-alcohol level, which is far lower than the 0.08 legal limit in 45 states.

South Carolina saw the greatest increase in its death rate during the four-year period, followed by Kansas, South Dakota, Rhode Island and Wisconsin. The states with the highest numbers of alcohol-related deaths per miles traveled were Montana, South Carolina, South Dakota, Nevada and Louisiana.

Barbara Harsha, executive director of the Governors Highway Safety Association in Washington, D.C., said experts can’t explain why some states have far fewer alcohol-related deaths than others.

"There don’t seem to be any patterns," she said. "Some have seen increases after a period of decreases and they’re doing the same things as they were in the past."

Harsha suspects rates remain high in some places because of a growing number of alcohol-related motorcycle accidents in the past five years. She also said motorists are driving faster than they used to, so they’re more likely to be in fatal crashes that may be fueled by alcohol.

Drunken driving deaths declined markedly during the 1980s and early ’90s as organizations such as Mothers Against Drunk Driving were formed and drew attention to the problem.

NHTSA’s report showed 26,173 alcohol-related traffic deaths in 1982, or 60 percent of all traffic deaths, falling to 16,572, or 40 percent, in 1999. For 2002, the figures were 17,419 alcohol-related deaths, or 41 percent of all traffic fatalities.

Earlier this month, NHTSA administrator Dr. Jeffrey Runge said the nation needs to establish special drunken driving courts, screen medical patients for alcohol abuse and enlist the help of alcohol manufacturers in order to combat the rise in death rates.

Thirty-one states and the District of Columbia saw their alcohol-related death rates decrease, NHTSA says in its new report. Four states — Vermont, Indiana, Oregon and Iowa — and the District of Columbia saw their rates fall by 25 percent or more. Vermont, Utah, Maine, New York and Indiana had the lowest overall death rates.

Copyright ©2003 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.