NC’s July 4 ‘Booze It & Lose It’ Campaign Kicks Off at Duke

The NC Governor’s Highway Safety Program runs June 24-July 7 and uses public outreach and increased traffic stops to encourage sober driving

Duke Assistant Chief of Police Alonzo Jaynes speaks at a news conference
Duke Assistant Chief of Police Alonzo Jaynes speaks at a news conference at Karsh Alumni and Visitors Center announcing the start of the 2024 "Operation Firecracker Booze It & Lose It" campaign. Photo by Travis Stanley

In his job as an emergency department physician at Duke University Hospital, John Purakal has had to deliver the most devastating news. He’s told parents that their child died because of an intoxicated driver. And he’s told parents that their child died because of their own decision to drink and drive.

He once had to tell a father that his infant daughter died because of a crash caused by the father’s impaired driving. And he once had to help a teenage girl off the floor after she collapsed at learning her father was killed because of a drunk driver.

“As a physician, I urge everyone to consider the real human cost of driving under the influence,” Purakal said Monday. “It is not just a bad decision for its legal, financial and social consequences. It is a potentially deadly one.”

Duke emergency department physician John Purakal speaks at a news conference at Duke's Karsh Alumni and Visitors Center
John Purakal, Duke Assistant Professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine in the School of Medicine, speaks at a news conference Monday announcing the start of the statewide Booze It & Lose It campaign around the Fourth of July holiday period. Photo by Travis Stanley

The 2024 “Operation Firecracker Booze It & Lose It” campaign kicked off Monday with an announcement at Duke’s Karsh Alumni and Visitors Center. The statewide campaign, which lasts until July 7, uses public outreach and increased law enforcement patrols and checkpoints to encourage sober driving during the Fourth of July holiday period.

In 2023, more than 500 people were killed in impaired driving-related crashes in North Carolina, according to Mark Ezzell, director of the N.C. Governor’s Highway Safety Program. 

“As we start off the July 4th holiday, it's a time when we should be thinking about family. We should thinking about fun. We should be thinking about a little bit of vacation,” said Ezzell, as dozens of police officers stood behind him. “We should not be thinking about the types of tragedies that unfortunately the law enforcement officers that I have behind me see every week.”

The importance of holding the kickoff event at Duke was not lost on Duke Assistant Chief of Police Alonzo Jaynes.

“Right here on our campus, parents trust us to protect their children,” Jaynes said. “And I think you all will agree when I say that traffic safety is part of that assignment.”

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