State of play: North Carolina counted 1,630 fatalities in 2022, the latest data available, a rate of 15.2 out of every 100,000 drivers.
North Carolina's rate dipped in the 2000s but began to slowly rise in the last decade, spurred in part by a spike in the pandemic era.
The big picture: About 3,300 people died nationwide in crashes attributed to distracted driving in 2022, and another 289,000 were injured, the new data shows.
Over 62,000 crashes involved distracted cell phone usage in 2022 alone.
Caveat: These stats likely underestimate the problem because crash data often relies on drivers self-reporting distractions to law enforcement, National Safety Council executive vice president of safety leadership and advocacy Mark Chung tells Axios.