Road traffic accidents are the second leading cause of death and serious injuries among Vietnamese children and adolescents, just behind drowning.
According to Nguyen Cong Bang, Deputy Director of the Transport Department under the Ministry of Transport, traffic accidents involving people aged below 18 accounted for around 10.63 percent of the country's road traffic accidents in Vietnam in 2021 against 6.75 percent previously.
This shows that road traffic accidents ranked second among causes of Vietnamese child and adolescent deaths, only after drowning.
Road traffic accidents also made-up half of deaths among people aged 15-19 in Vietnam in the 2016-2021 period.
Bang added that every day, roughly 17 million children in Vietnam travel between home and school 2-4 times. Among those, many must walk to school along roads without pavements or on routes with mixed traffic lanes, posing dangers.
Vietnam has set a goal to reduce the annual number of accidents, deaths, and injuries by five to 10 percent, the Ministry of Transport said.
A report made by the National Committee for Traffic Safety was cited by Vietnam News Agency as saying that, last year, 11,457 traffic accidents occurred nationwide, causing 6,397 deaths and 7,804 injuries.
The numbers represent a drop of 38 accidents (0.33 percent), an increase of 598 fatalities (10.31 percent) and a reduction of 214 injuries from the previous year.
Traffic accidents second largest cause of child deaths in Vietnam
Road traffic accidents are the second leading cause of death and serious injuries among Vietnamese children and adolescents, just behind drowning.
Source: dtinews.vn, LD
