JEDDAH: The number of people killed in traffic accidents in Saudi roads has risen almost 10 percent to just over 7,000 in the past year, according to Dr. Khaled Al-Eisa, supervisor general of King Abdul Aziz Hospital in south Jeddah. This figure works out at 19.1 death every day and makes the Kingdom’s roads some of the most dangerous in the world.
Speaking at a belated event on Sunday to mark International Disability Day, which took place on Dec. 3, Al-Eisa said that traffic accidents were one of the major reasons for the increase in the number of disabled people in the Kingdom. There had been some 284,000 road accidents in the past year, resulting in 1,481 disabled people.
Saudi Arabia already had one of the highest traffic fatality rates in the world. In 2008, the figure for road deaths was 6,400. In 2005, the number of people killed in road accidents was 4,000.
The latest figure represents 25.9 road deaths per 100,000 population. This figure is not as bad as Iran’s 44 per 100,000, but is way ahead of countries like the US (19 per 100,000, the world average) or Canada (nine per 100,000). In 2008, there were 23.7 deaths per 100,000. In the UK, with more than twice the population, there were 2,538 road deaths in 2008, less than half the number in Saudi Arabia. In Spain there were 2,182.
In just five years, the official death toll from road accidents has risen 75 percent.
“The financial cost of accidents is three times as much of the combined expenditure of education and health sectors in the Kingdom. The financial loss caused by traffic accidents exceeds SR20 billion annually,” said Al-Eisa.
One brighter picture is in Riyadh. Prince Sattam, Riyadh’s deputy governor and chairman of the Higher Committee for Traffic Safety, reported last month a substantial reduction in traffic accidents this year following a successful road safety initiative.
“The rate of deaths caused by accidents declined from 35 per 100,000 cars in 2004 to 17 per 100,000 in 2008,” the prince said.
