You’re driving home and you hear your phone go off. You’ve gotten a text message. Unfortunately, many of us, teens and adults alike, would reach over and look at our phone without a second thought. It’s practically muscle memory. And while you’ve probably heard it time and time again, no one seems to change. People just assume that they’ll never get in an accident, but this isn’t true.

Here are just a few shocking facts about distracted driving…

1. 9 people die every day in the U.S. because of distracted driving. That’s at least 3,285 people every single year and that doesn’t even include the people who are injured.
2. 1 in 4 or 25% of car crashes involve a cell phone.
3. 31% of U.S. drivers ages 18-64 admitted to reading a message while driving.
4. 69% of drivers in the United States ages 18-64  admitted to talking on their cell phone while driving.
5. You are twice as likely to die in an accident when you are using a cell phone.
6. At 55mph, if you look away from your phone for only 5 seconds, you have covered an entire football field.

To put it simply, driving while on a cell phone is extremely unsafe and you are risking your life, as well as many other lives, every time you look at your cell phone. So, at the end of the day ask yourself – is that text message really worth it?

Sources: CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), Huffington Post