Andrea Whitley is a prime example of what can happen if you don’t buckle up.

The 39-year-old Fairborn resident was ejected from her 1995 Chevrolet Blazer after she pulled out in front of a 2007 Toyota Corolla at the intersection of West Enon and Yellow Springs-Fairfield roads, according to the crash report.

The vehicles collided and the Blazer was launched off the southwest corner of the intersection and flipped over onto its side. During the rollover, Whitley was ejected and the vehicle landed on top of her, pinning her to the ground.

Whitley has no recollection of the crash, which left her with fluid pockets on her legs, a burn on her stomach from the catalytic converter and memory problems. She underwent brain surgery, remained in the hospital from Oct. 27 to Dec. 6, and is receiving both speech and physical therapy.

Still, she feels lucky. “I’m just amazed I made it through,” she said.

Seat belts are a big contributor to why people survive car wrecks. A Dayton Daily News analysis of crash data found that those who don’t wear safety belts in vehicle crashes are 47 times more likely to die and 10 times more likely to suffer a serious injury.

And, the analysis found, those who don’t buckle up are more than 100 times more likely to be ejected from their vehicle.

Ejections often result in some of the worst injuries suffered in car crashes, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Seat belt math

The math about seat belts is hard to dispute.

Wearing a seat belt reduces the chances of sustaining a moderate to serious injury in a crash by 50 percent and a fatal injury by 45 percent, according to John Ulczycki, group vice president of strategic initiatives for the Chicago-based National Safety Council.

A safety council study from 2008 estimated that 4,152 lives could have been saved that year if all those involved in crashes wore seat belts.

The Daily News analysis found an overwhelming majority of people involved in crashes in 2009 — about 85 percent — were wearing seat belts. But serious injuries and deaths were far more likely for those who didn’t. More than 56 percent of the people who died in crashes were not wearing seat belts.

The findings track with surveys the state has conducted since 1991. The annual survey uses retired state troopers who fan out across the state and make observations of seat belt usage for drivers and front-seat passengers. In 2010, the study conducted by Miami University’s Applied Research Center found that 83.8 percent of those surveyed were wearing safety belts — up 0.2 percent from 2009.

Nationwide, seat belt usage hit 85 percent in 2010, according to the National Occupant Protection Use Survey.

Ulczycki, who served as executive director of the Airbag & Seat Belt Safety Campaign and who also worked on the national Click it or Ticket campaign, said serious crashes often lead to devastating brain and spinal injuries.

“If you have a 40-pound child in a 30-mile-per-hour crash, that crash carries a force of 1,200 pounds on their organs, brain and spinal cord or whatever else is hit,” he said. “It is a terrific amount of force. You cannot imagine applying that much force in other ways. Imagine taking a hammer and pounding your brain with it.”

Through the years such warnings had little impact on motorists. In the early 1980s — after more than 15 years of campaigns and millions of dollars spent on awareness programs — only about 14 percent of Americans wore seat belts.

It was not until states started adopting laws requiring people to buckle up that the practice became widespread, according to the safety council.

In Ohio, that progress has slowed of late. After years of increasing steadily, seat belt usage changed little in recent years — up just 2 percentage points since 2005, the latest annual survey for the Ohio Department of Public Safety found.

To get more people to buckle up, some organizations believe, Ohio needs to toughen its seat belt law. However, previous attempts to do so have encountered opposition, including as recently as 2009, when Republicans in the Ohio Senate removed it from a transportation budget bill. Those who argue against a tougher seat belt law say it is an infringement on personal liberty and an excuse for law enforcement to pull people over for no legitimate reason.

Seat belt laws

Ohio has a secondary seat belt law, meaning a driver can’t be pulled over solely for not wearing a seat belt, but can be cited if stopped for another violation, such as speeding. Ohio is one of 20 states that do not allow motorists to be pulled over simply for not wearing a seat belt.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that upgrading from a secondary to a primary law on average leads to a 14 percent increase in safety belt usage and a 7 percent reduction in deaths related to crashes.

A study by the Center for Injury Research and Policy at the Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus estimated Ohio could save at least $15 million a year in Medicaid costs and more than $91 million in 10 years by changing the seat belt law. It assumed a 10 percentage-point increase in seat belt use.

In addition to the safety factor, some of the medical bills resulting from crashes fall on taxpayers. The Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital conservatively estimated that injuries resulting from Ohioans not wearing seat belts in 2003 alone would result in at least $51 million in Medicaid bills over 10 years.

“This is even an underestimate of the problem,” said Kristen Conner, the study’s primary author. “More enforcement and a stricter enforcement law could have such a great impact.”

Just last week, Ohio flunked a national highway safety report card — one of seven states that received the lowest ranking — in part because of its secondary seat belt law.

When asked about the state’s low ranking, Mike Dittoe, spokesman for House Speaker William Batchelder III, R-Medina, said that bills dealing with issues in the report have been introduced in the past and that he expects them to be introduced again. Batchelder will evaluate how the House should handle them after reviewing them, he said.

Andrea Whitley won’t have to be told again. She said she almost always buckles her seat belt and doesn’t know why she didn’t that one day.

But from now on, she said, “When I leave my driveway I will have my seat belt on.”