‘Saher fails to reduce road deaths’

The Saher system has not reduced deaths caused by traffic accidents on the Kingdom's roads because it has not been applied widely enough across the country, according to a researcher at King Abdullah International Medical Research Center.
Saud Al-Turki, the regional director of research on injuries, also accused traffic officials of not enforcing laws, causing drivers to continue driving recklessly and killing people.
He challenged current statistics on deaths, saying it stands at 41 daily, rather than 20 a day claimed by the traffic department, which makes the Kingdom's roads the most dangerous globally.
Al-Turki said the Saher system reduced accidents and injuries in the first 10 years of operation, but not the number of deaths.
This was because the system has not been implemented in a comprehensive manner in the Kingdom. He made this assertion in a paper submitted to the Global Conference on Casualty and Accident Medicine held at the Security Forces Hospital in Riyadh this week.
Al-Turki said traffic officials ignore 69 percent of violations that cause accidents, such as reckless driving.
Al-Turki said the annual reports of the traffic department show that speeding and running red lights that the Saher system focuses on represent only 31 percent of traffic accidents. “This has encouraged drivers to continue breaching traffic rules which in turn has contributed to the increasing number of accidents and deaths.”
“Death statistics cited by the traffic department only count people who die at accident scenes. It does not take into account deaths inside hospital operating theaters or intensive care units,” said Al-Turki.
The World Health Organization, he said, compiles statistics that include the number of deaths one month after accidents. “This means that the recorded death toll here represents only 48 percent of the total.”
He said this data shows there were 14,306 deaths in the Kingdom in 2012, not 7,153 as cited by traffic officials from the 544,000 accidents that took place.
This means that instead of the 20 deaths daily, the figure is actually 41 deaths, making the Kingdom's roads the most dangerous in the world.