13-06-2006
Seatbelt campaign a big hit
The seatbelt campaign organized by the traffic and patrols department of the Abu Dhabi Police have fetched good result creating the safety awareness among the motorists and making it a habit to wear the seat belt while traveling.
The campaign is organized in cooperation with the adnoc, has seen the motorists using seat belt has gone up in Abu Dhabi from 35.4 per cent to 51.5 present according to the study conducted by Dr.Yusof Al Hosani, a specialist in preventive medicine and public health and a researcher on traffic safety.
The new figures are based on the first two phases of the campaign alone and the study makes a case for the awareness campaign to strongly focus on youth .Initial indicators shows that it is possible to reduce the number of deaths due to road accidents among UAE nationals by at least 75 per cent.
Increasing the use of seatbelts by 90 percent could save an average of 50 lives annually, the study estimates.
In Abu Dhabi, the use of seatbelts among nationals have increased from 6percent before the campaign was launched to 15persent within a month of the campaign.21 nationals lost their lives to preventable road accidents in 2005 and a total of 215 UAE nationals have died in such incidents over the past 20 years.
