India- Road safety, a concern for all

OFF THE WIRE
India:http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2010/12/04/road-safety-a-concern-all.html
Road safety, a concern for all

Tommy Dharmawan, Jakarta
A 2004 WHO report estimated that 1.27 million people die and between 20 million and 50 million were injured annually in road accidents.
In Asia and the Pacific, road accidents are a major public health problem, with some 10 million people severely injured or killed annually on the region’s roads, the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned.
The Asia-Pacific region accounts for about 60 percent of global road deaths, despite having only 16 percent of the world’s vehicles.
Road deaths jumped by nearly 40 percent in Asia between 1987 and 1995 — while in developed nations, the number fell by about 10 percent because of better safety measures.
WHO estimates that if current trends continue, road accidents will be the third global cause of disease or injury by 2020 after heart disease and depression.
In high-income countries, most of those killed or injured in road accidents are drivers of four-wheeled vehicles. But in low- and medium-income countries, “vulnerable road users” — pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists, and users of public transportation — make up a larger proportion of those injured or killed.
In low- and medium-income countries, a motorcycle is a family vehicle, with children routinely transported as passengers and helmets rarely used.
Road accidents are a huge economic drain. It is estimated that every year, road traffic accidents cost US$518 billion globally.
The cost of road crashes on country economies is often as high as 2 to 3 percent of GNP — more than the total annual amount received in development aid.
Many victims are the bread winners and, when injured or killed, their families are left without economic support. In addition, those who survive often need immediate hospital care and many require long-term support.
These injuries impose substantial economic burdens on developing nations. As a result, there is a direct link between road safety improvement and poverty reduction.
Problems associated with injuries and violence include insufficient awareness and understanding of the magnitude of the problem; a lack of national policies and plans on injury prevention; and a limited national capacity to collect and analyze injury data and design interventions.
Governments need to develop and implement national policies, programs and legislation on injury prevention; to promote public awareness and political commitment; and to strengthen national capacities in surveillance, intervention and monitoring.
Simple measures can be taken to make people safer on the roads. The measures, WHO said, include setting and enforcing appropriate speed limits; setting and enforcing blood alcohol limits; introducing and enforcing mandatory seat belt, helmet and child restraint laws; providing safer routes for pedestrians and cyclists, constructing speed bumps, separating different types of traffic; and improving the emergency services from the crash scene to the health facility and beyond.
Drinking and driving is one of the main causes of road crashes worldwide. In high-income countries about 20 percent of fatally injured drivers have excess alcohol in their blood, while in some low- and middle-income countries these figures may be up to 69 percent.
Effective drinking and driving programs have the potential to save thousands of lives.
Wearing a motorcycle helmet can cut the risk of death by almost 40 percent, and the risk of severe injury by 72 percent.
Light-colored helmets were found to be associated with a lower risk of a crash. A study concluded that 18 percent of crashes could be avoided if non-white helmets were eliminated.
Child restraints (infant and child seats and booster seats) reduce the death rate in car accidents by 71 percent among infants and by 54 percent among young children. Seat belts have saved more lives in accidents than any other road safety measures.
“Road deaths have increased with a nation’s economic growth, but governments can incorporate safety strategies now to avoid this pattern.”
Wearing a seatbelt belt reduces the risk of bring ejected from a vehicle and suffering serious or fatal injury by 40 to 65 percent.
Teenage drivers have more than five times the risk of a fatal crash compared with drivers aged 30 years and above, at every level of blood alcohol content.
In many countries, a high proportion of injured pedestrians who have consumed alcohol fall in the 16-19 year age group.
Speed is the main factor contributing to road traffic injuries in most countries. Reducing average speed by 1 km/hour has been shown to lead to a 4 to 5 percent decrease in fatal accidents.
Research shows that a 5 percent increase in average speed leads to approximately a 10 percent increase in all injury crashes and a 20 percent increase in fatal crashes.
Creating and enforcing laws that require seat belts and helmets and punish drunken driving is a proven, cost-effective injury prevention strategy, said Dr. Kelly Henning, director of global health programs at Bloomberg Philanthropies. For every person dying as a result of injury, there are hundreds more that sustain non-fatal injuries and other health consequences.
Although the ultimate goal must be to prevent injuries from happening in the first place, much can be done to minimize the disability and ill-health arising from the injuries that do occur despite the best prevention efforts.
Providing quality support and care services to victims is therefore an essential component of any response to intentional and unintentional injuries. Appropriate services for victims of non-fatal injuries can prevent future fatalities, reduce the amount of short-term and long-term disability, and help those affected to cope with the impact of the injury on their lives.
Historically, road deaths have increased with a nation’s economic growth, but governments can incorporate safety strategies into transportation and infrastructure plans now to avoid this pattern, said Tony Bliss, lead road safety specialist at the World Bank.
If we could successfully turn this around, it would be one of the great 21st-century public health achievements.