Abdullah Al-Jamili

Al-Madinah



Did you know that wars in the Western Sahara left 15,000 people killed while the war between India and Pakistan left 13,000 killed on both sides?



In the Gulf War, 5,200 people were killed. The total number of people killed in Croatian war of independence was 16,000 people. The total number of casualties from all these wars is not more than 50,000 people.



Now, can you believe that the total number of people killed in Saudi Arabia in road accidents in the past 20 years was 86,000 people, while the number of people injured is more than 600,000 in about 4 million accidents? This has made Saudi Arabia top of the world when it comes to accident rates.



Annual losses as a result of these accidents amounts to SR13 billion. It is expected to reach SR19 billion by 2014 and SR23 billion by 2019. Most of this money is spent on treatment and rehabilitation of those injured in such accidents. Thirty percent of beds in hospitals are reserved for road accident victims. Road accidents are the main cause of a lack of beds in hospitals. I am not surprised because there is one injury every 15 minutes and an accident every two minutes.



I am sorry that there are many numbers in this article but it is the painful truth. It is a street war that has been killing people for many years. Yes, there have been many attempts to formulate strategic plans and implement rules and regulations to limit accident rates in the country, but have they worked?



The numbers speak for themselves: They did not work. In 2001, 4,100 people died in road accidents. In 2004, the number increased to 5,200. In 2011, it increased to 7,153 people, while the number of fatalities is expected to reach 9,604 in 2019.



It is easy to reduce the number of car accidents if there is the will. There are many countries like England and Denmark that have created plans to reduce the number of car accidents and they managed to reach their goals. Denmark reached its goals six years before the end of the plan.



We are living a true street war. A traffic awareness campaign is not enough. We need a national plan in which all government and civil organizations participate. Our joint efforts succeeded in crushing terror cells, even though they were hiding among us. But why it did not help in putting an end to the terror on the streets?