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from the 'hit-the-road'-but-don't-take-it-literally dept.
ScienceNews reports on a report from the CDC (informative graph):
U.S. drivers love to hit the road. The problem is doing so safely.
In 2013, 32,894 people in the United States died in motor vehicle crashes. Although down since 2000, the overall death rate - 10.3 per 100,000 people - tops 19 other high-income countries, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported July 8. Belgium is a distant second with 6.5 deaths per 100,000. Researchers reviewed World Health Organization and other data on vehicle crash deaths, seat belt use and alcohol-impaired driving in 2000 and 2013.
Canada had the highest percentage of fatal crashes caused by drunk drivers: 33.6 percent. New Zealand and the United States tied for second at 31 percent. But Canada and 16 other countries outperformed the United States on seat belt use - even though, in 2013, 87 percent of people in the United States reported wearing safety belts while riding in the front seat.
Spain saw the biggest drop - 75 percent - in its crash death rate. That country improved nearly all aspects of road safety, including decreasing alcohol-impaired driving and increasing seat belt use, the researchers say.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by frojack on Sunday July 24 2016, @07:01AM
To all the thing you mention you have to add that the proper measure is NOT "10.3 deaths per 100,000 people" as TFA suggests. The proper measure is "Deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled". (World wide this statistic tends to be collected in deaths per billion KM traveled.)
It doesn't matter how many people you have, or how many cars you have or how many roads you have. All that matters is how many miles are wracked up each year.
For the US there are 1.08 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled. Converted to world numbers that comes out to 7.1 deaths per billion Km vehicle miles traveled. The US isn't in the best position when measured this way but we are far from the worst. 55.9 for Brazil. 18.2 for South Korea.
But the big problem is most contraries have no idea of how many miles are traveled per year. They just don't measure it. So they don't know how bad their death toll actual is.
Half of the world’s road traffic deaths occur among motorcyclists. HALF. And motorcyclists are a much higher percentage of vehicles in poorer countries.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Monday July 25 2016, @09:36AM
The _real_ reference behind TFA actually _does_ use deaths per distance traveled, if you look at the right column:
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/65/wr/mm6526e1.htm#T1_down [cdc.gov]
What is most interesting to me is not the absolute numbers, since there are some purely situational / geographical factors that could account for that, it is that the US has shown least improvement (by a long way) over the 13 or so years compared. The US is doing something very different, question is what. It _may_ be bad driving, but it might be other things - the US has a completely different car market and car safety standards to everywhere else (except maybe Canada) for one thing, maybe the US penchant for bigger (well, f***king enormous) cars compared to elsewhere is actually reducing safety.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday July 28 2016, @04:09AM
US safety standards drive the standards for rest of the world. And larger is safer in almost every case.
So it isn't the equipment.
It might be the price of fuel.
But just look at those Vehicle miles traveled (billions) column in the link you posted. No country comes close. Look at Registered vehicles. No country comes close.
So sheer Traffic Density is my guess.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.