Child motor vehicle occupant and pedestrian casualties before and after enactment of Child Restraint Seats Legislation in Japan

Problem. Prevention of injuries to child passengers is a significant public health priority, as motor vehicle-related injuries remain a leading cause of death for children in Japan. The purpose of compulsory child restraint seats legislation in April 2000 was to reduce the number of child passengers killed or injured in motor vehicle crashes.

Methods. The objectives of this preliminary evaluation are to measure the effectiveness, benefits and usage of safety seats for child passengers aged 1–5 years by analysing the child casualty data for the period of 1997–2002. Population and vehicle miles travelled based injury and fatality rates were used to compare before and after legislation trends in child casualties.

Results. Despite overall increases in the use of child restraint seats (as observed by different national surveys), overall casualty rates in motor vehicle occupants in the 1–5 year age group did not change (fatalities and serious injuries) or even increased (minor injuries).

Conclusions. Casualties among restrained children have not decreased since the law came to effect in the year 2000, perhaps because of incorrect usage of the seats. Given that exposure to crash environments is increasing, traffic safety advocates and public health community need to be aware of the importance of child restraints as a means of reducing the likelihood of injury. It is necessary to implement effective community-based child safety seat campaigns to disseminate the information on appropriate restraint use and to increase efforts to enforce the existing legislation.     

Fatality rate of pedestrians and fatal crash involvement rate of drivers in pedestrian crashes: a case study of Iran

The aim of this study was to uncover patterns of pedestrian crashes. In the first stage, 34,178 pedestrian-involved crashes occurred in Iran during a four-year period were grouped into homogeneous clusters using a clustering analysis. Next, some in-cluster and inter-cluster crash patterns were analysed. The clustering analysis yielded six pedestrian crash groups. Car/van/pickup crashes on rural roads as well as heavy vehicle crashes were found to be less frequent but more likely to be fatal compared to other crash clusters. In addition, after controlling for crash frequency in each cluster, it was found that the fatality rate of each pedestrian age group as well as the fatal crash involvement rate of each driver age group varies across the six clusters. Results of present study has some policy implications including, promoting pedestrian safety training sessions for heavy vehicle drivers, imposing limitations over elderly heavy vehicle drivers, reinforcing penalties toward under 19 drivers and motorcyclists. In addition, road safety campaigns in rural areas may be promoted to inform people about the higher fatality rate of pedestrians on rural roads. The crash patterns uncovered in this study might also be useful for prioritizing future pedestrian safety research areas.