The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) will sponsor a series of events from April 23 to 29 aimed at increasing awareness of the devastating impact of traffic crashes in the Americas. The events will be held both at PAHO headquarters in Washington, D.C., and in member countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.

At its headquarters in Geneva, the World Health Organization (WHO) will host the World Youth Assembly for Road Safety, which will be the key WHO event of the first United Nations Global Road Safety Week. Representatives from most countries of the Americas will attend the assembly.

The first United Nations Global Road Safety Week is designed to promote action, in all the world's countries, to reduce the most common risk factors associated with serious injuries, disability, and death from automobile crashes throughout the world.

Among its objectives, the initiative seeks to influence and advise institutions, leaders and decision-makers at all levels to help strengthen their commitment to making substantive policy and legal changes to improve road safety.

Alcohol and speed, helmets and seatbelts

Experts on traffic safety say that the most important risk factors for traffic injuries include alcohol abuse and lack of compliance with speed limits, which is often widespread. In addition, failure to use seatbelts and helmets increases the severity of injuries. Structural deficiencies in road design and traffic signals are also key factors.

A preventable epidemic

Dr. Eugenia María Silveira Rodrígues, PAHO regional advisor on road safety, notes that 85% of global traffic fatalities occur in middle and low income countries. Traffic fatality rates in Latin America are among the highest in the world, according to WHO/PAHO data, with 26 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants in 2000.

Worldwide, traffic accidents kill some 1.2 million people each year and cause serious injuries or disabilities in 20-50 million more. U.N. data show that traffic crashes are the second leading cause of death in young people ages 5 to 25.

Road Safety Week will raise awareness among millions of young people in the Americas and elsewhere and encourage them to become key actors in prevention, says Dr. Rodrígues.

Reportes procedentes de Naciones Unidas informan que las colisiones de tránsito constituyen la segunda causa principal de muertes en las personas de entre 5 y 25 años. Dentro de este grupo de edad, los varones jóvenes (peatones, ciclistas, motociclistas, conductores principiantes y pasajeros) tienen una probabilidad aproximadamente tres veces mayor de morir o sufrir traumatismos en las carreteras que las mujeres jóvenes.

Regional studies

The PAHO region has made notable strides in reducing the toll of traffic injuries. According to a study by the U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, Colombia, Chile, Costa Rica and Cuba reduced traffic fatality rates significantly between 1996 and 2003. Despite such progress, says Dr. Rodrígues, there remains much work to be done to reduce preventable injuries, disabilities, and deaths due to traffic crashes.

"The high incidence of traffic injuries and death among youths is a tragic and complex phenomenon that depletes scarce resources, causes great suffering, impedes the full development of our young people, and overwhelms the response capacity of many countries. Road safety is not an accident. It is a form of social inequity, because society's most vulnerable members, including young people, are affected most. Addressing this epidemic will require political courage and decisive programmatic and legislative action in all the countries of our region."

Publications

-- World report on road traffic injury prevention (WHO/World Bank 2004)
-- The global road safety crisis
-- Milestones in international road safety: World Health Day 2004 and beyond (2005)
-- Make roads safe: a new priority for sustainable development (2006)
-- Helmets: a road safety manual for decition-makers and practitioners

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