Can a Breathalyzer Show Alcohol If You Weren't Drinking?
Breathalyzer false positives, the speeding threshold that puts points on your license, and Georgia's minimum auto policy limits explained.
Roadside traffic stops and the paperwork that follows shape a surprising number of injury claims. A breath test result, the number written on a speeding citation, or the size of an at-fault driver’s insurance policy can all change how a case unfolds. Most drivers never think about any of it until they’re standing on the shoulder of I-285 with an officer’s flashlight in their face. Here’s what you should understand before that happens.
A Breathalyzer Can Register Alcohol Even If You Haven’t Had a Drink
It surprises people, but yes — you can blow a positive result on a breathalyzer without having consumed any alcohol at all.
The device isn’t measuring alcohol in your bloodstream directly. It’s reading compounds on your breath and translating that reading into a number. Your body chemistry can interfere with that process. Someone in ketosis, for example, produces compounds that a breath test machine may not distinguish from alcohol. Certain breads and foods can throw off a reading. Individual differences in digestion can do the same thing.
That matters because a breath test result carries enormous weight in how everyone treats you afterward — the officer at the scene, the insurance adjuster reviewing the file, and eventually a jury if the case goes that far. If you were tested and the number doesn’t match reality, do not assume the machine is beyond question. Write down what you ate, whether you were fasting or on a low-carb diet, and any medical conditions you have. Those details are the foundation of a challenge to the result, and they get harder to reconstruct with every week that passes.
The Speeding Number That Determines Whether You Get Points
There is a threshold most drivers don’t know about: 15 miles per hour over the limit. Fourteen over and under, you won’t get points on your license. Fifteen and above, you will.
Pay attention to the number written on your citation the next time you get one. You’ll notice a pattern — an awful lot of speeding tickets come in at exactly 15 over. That’s not a coincidence. Officers know where the line sits, and writing the ticket at that number gives everyone room to negotiate later. It becomes a bargaining tool.
The practical takeaway is twofold. First, if you’re cited at 15 over, that number is often more negotiable than it looks, and it’s worth talking to someone before you simply pay the fine. Second, if you were injured by a driver who was speeding, the number on their citation tells you something about how the responding officer viewed the severity of the conduct — which is useful when you’re building a case about fault.
Georgia’s Minimum Insurance Limits and Why They Run Out Fast
Georgia’s minimum auto liability policy is a 25/50 policy. That means $25,000 available if one person in a vehicle is injured, and $50,000 total if there are two or more. Fifty thousand dollars is the ceiling on the whole policy.
Read those numbers next to the cost of an actual serious injury and the problem becomes obvious. A trip to the emergency room, imaging, a surgical consult, physical therapy, and time away from work can consume a minimum policy before anyone has even discussed pain and suffering. When the at-fault driver carries nothing more than the state minimum, that policy is frequently the first place your recovery hits a wall — not the value of your injuries.
This is exactly why uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage on your own policy matters so much. It’s the coverage that steps in when the other driver’s limits can’t cover what happened to you. It’s inexpensive relative to what it protects, and most drivers who have it don’t realize how much of their eventual recovery it will account for.
What To Do After a Serious Crash
Get medical attention, get a copy of the accident report, and find out what coverage exists — both the other driver’s and your own. If a breath test was administered, preserve everything you can remember about the circumstances. Then talk to a lawyer before you have any substantive conversation with an insurance company. The early decisions in a case tend to be the ones that limit what’s possible later.
Full Transcript
So the first question is, if you take a breathalyzer test and you’ve had nothing to drink, can you still come up positive for alcohol? I believe so. Okay. The reason being, maybe a patient’s, clients in ketosis, yeah, something like that. Okay, yes. You can still come up positive on a breathalyzer. Certain breads, people’s bodies and digestive systems and stuff, it can get thrown off even if they’ve had no alcohol.
Second question is, how fast over the speed limit can you go before you get points on your license? Fifteen miles an hour. Fifteen, okay. Fourteen miles an hour and under, you won’t get any points on your license. Okay, yeah. So as long as you keep it — but if you notice, most times when people get a speeding ticket, it’s fifteen over. Yeah, so they use that as a bargaining tool. “Registration, please.” “Here you go, officer.”
The last question is, what’s the minimum policy in Georgia for insurance? I gave you a softball on this one. Let me just do it. You can do it. Fifty thousand. So it’s a 25/50 policy. So if it’s one person in the vehicle, it’s twenty-five thousand. If it’s two, it’s fifty. So yeah, you are right, it’s a total 25/50.
All right, yeah man. You gotta — no man, I left it blank for you because I couldn’t remember how you wanted it. Yes sir. Yeah man, thanks for being patient. Oh no.