NTSB Calls for Alcohol Detection Systems in All New Vehicles

What about freedoms? Unlike speech, you don't have a Constitutional right to drive drunk. I think even hard libertarians would balk at arguing "people should have the right to down 8 beers and then tear up 70mph on the highway". Because unlike freedom of expression drunk driving really does impact others, it's one of the leading causes of death and "I drive completely fine when drunk" is something nobody can say confidently.

What if the BAC fails when you're not drunk? After all BACs aren't 100% accurate. Now this really is a serious issue. But it's also something I really don't see happening. Because false positives in the BAC hurt sales, so auto manufacturers are going to skew towards false negatives. Capitalism is a really strong force, and capitalism says you don't want to prevent people from starting their car unless they are definitely drunk, because that generates bad coverage which ultimately hurts sales. Especially because the regulations are going in effect three years the earliest, so there's plenty of time to device better easier tests, so consumers aren't compelled to ditch your car for one with no BAC or a more reliable BAC.

Ok, but what if I'm drunk and there's a huge tornado or someone's chasing me and the only option is to drive recklessly? This is also an issue. But perhaps in that case there could be some emergency override which notifies law enforcement.

Ok, but what about speeding? The NTSB is not having vehicles check for speeding and they will not any time soon. Everyone speeds, on certain roads you actually put yourself in danger by driving under the speed limit, and speed limits are ultimately widely regarded as dumb. DUI laws are widely regarded as not dumb.

The bottom line is, unless there are really exceptional circumstances, you should not be driving drunk. And nobody is arguing that you should be allowed to drive drunk. So I think something which physically prevents you from driving drunk and breaking a near universally-accepted law, despite limiting your freedoms, is fine.

But this feels more like "design machine with appropriate safeguards so owner cant kill self/others" ... like SawStop or Bosch REAXX on circular saws or a Riving Knife on a table saw. Designing a tool/device/vehicle to avoid injury, especially when that injury can impact people around them is a good thing. Trains have devices to (attempt) to ensure the driver is paying attention to prevent accidents. With numbers like "over 10000 deaths due to drunk driving each year" and "over 100000 injuries related to drunk driving accidents each year" it starts to look like allowing people to operate these vehicles while under the influence is something the manufacturers should be preventing to avoid injury to the public.