Road Traffic Injuries: A Hidden Epidemic

November 4, 2008—Road safety has been almost totally ignored as an issue of sustainable development. It’s often missing from major multilateral policies and programs for sustainable development.

Yet, road traffic deaths and injuries are rapidly increasing, particularly in the developing world, where they affect millions of human lives and costs billions of dollars in economic costs every year.

• Each year, 1.2 million people die in road crashes worldwide, and as many as 50 million are injured or disabled.
• In poorer countries, if fatality rates per vehicle were reduced by 30% by 2020, more than 2.5 million lives could be saved and 200 million injuries avoided.

Some of the leading causes of road accidents include:

• Poor infrastructure
• Lack of helmet use
• Lack of seatbelt use
• Excessive speed
• Drink driving
• Poor governance and corruption

Making Roads Safer

Improving road safety will take the combined efforts of governments, policymakers, public health officials, vehicle manufactures and civil society groups. The first step toward this is recognizing road safety as an important element of the development agenda. As individuals, there are also things we can do to help:

• Encourage governments to make roads safe
• Identify local safety problems
• Abide by the speed limit
• Never drive if over the alcohol limit
• Always wear a seatbelt
• Always wear a crash helmet when riding a bike or motorbike

How safe are the roads where you live? What could be improved? Hit the road and email us your photos.