It wasn?t until after their son?s death on Oct. 24, 2010, that Dan and Deb Ellefson knew much about text messaging. What they learned, in the hardest way possible, was that drivers who read and send text messages can be at least as dangerous as drunken drivers, and that young people ? who use text messaging obsessively ? are woefully ignorant of the hazards it poses. “Everybody texts and the general feeling is, especially among young people, they?re texting and driving and they think that?s perfectly OK, they think they?re being safe,” Dan Ellefson said. “But the truth is they?re not. It?s extremely dangerous.”
Office of Strategic Communication