What Direction is Needed to Reduce Road Trauma in Australia?

Over the past 10 years road deaths in Australia have declined from 9.4 deaths per 100,000 population in 1998 to 6.8 deaths per 100,000 population in 2008; a decline of 28% [1]. Much of this decline can be attributed to the ongoing road safety strategies that are being delivered across local, state (including territory) and federal government jurisdictions. The focus of these strategies has been guided, in part, by the National Road Safety Strategy 2001-2010 [2] which included an array of measures aimed at reducing the number of road fatalities to 5.6 deaths per 100,000 population by 2010. The strategic objectives outlined in the strategy ranged from an ongoing focus to improve road user behaviour and the safety of our roads and vehicles to the adoption of new technologies to reduce human error and enhancements to the trauma, medical and retrieval services that ultimately respond to the failures by the users of the road transport system.