THE GOVERNMENT yesterday pledged to reduce motor vehicle accidents as well as the mortality rate by 25 per cent over the next five years by making road safety issues a high national priority in its future policy decisions.
Robert Pickersgill, Minister of Transport and Works, has invited submissions from members of the public to assist with the development of a National Road Safety Policy, a critical initiative towards creating a safe traffic environment. The deadline for submissions is February 27, 2004. The Minister was speaking at a press briefing at his Pawsey Road, New Kingston office.
DRAFT POLICY
"Comments will thereafter be evaluated, and any amendments made to the draft policy will be sent to Cabinet for approval. The Cabinet's permission will also be sought to have the draft policy tabled in Parliament as a White Paper," Mr. Pickersgill said.
The draft policy will be officially launched later this year by Prime Minister P.J. Patterson who is also chairman of the National Road Safety Council.
The policy contains a comprehensive mix of approaches, designed to reduce and prevent the occurrence of accidents. These approaches are organised in the categories of engineering and the traffic environment, education and information, enforcement and legislation, emergency response, and evaluation.
During his address, Minister Pickersgill announced that motor vehicle accidents extracted a cost of US$518 million from government coffers annually. He noted that in 2002, it was estimated that over $1.4 billion was spent to provide health care to individuals as a result of motor vehicle accidents. That year, 12,245 people were taken to accident and emergency units at various hospitals.
HUMAN BEHAVIOUR
The Minister blamed "inappropriate human behaviour" for the road accidents, and pointed out that the carnage on the road exacted a high toll on national productivity and potential, especially in the male population.
"For the period, 1991 to 2000, 81 per cent of road fatalities involved males, while 18.5 per cent of such fatalities involved females, a ratio of four to one. For the same period, 95 per cent of the drivers who died as a result of motor vehicle accidents were male, with the remaining five per cent female. "The overwhelming majority of the males were in their productive years, and in this regard, the age cohort 20 to 29 years is the most affected," the Minister said.
The Minister also revealed that the government would be moving to cut motor vehicle speeds in defined areas in a bid to make roadways safer in the latest measure to curtail tragedies involving school children. Children between the ages of 0 to 14 account for one-third of pedestrian fatalities. The latest incident involved 12-year-old Merl Grove High school student Shakara Harris who was killed last week Friday on Constant Spring Road, Half-Way Tree, St. Andrew in the vicinity of her school.
