Drumheller RCMP will be focusing on seat belt enforcement for the month of October.
Throughout the month of October, Alberta RCMP, along with other enforcement partners such as Sheriffs, will step up efforts to educate drivers on the proper use of seat belts and child safety seats.
“Drivers are responsible for their safety and the safety of their passengers by making sure everyone is buckled up properly,” says S/Sgt. A.A.Hopkins. “Of those who are ejected from a vehicle during a collision, 75 per cent die. The cause of death is directly related to their choice to not wear a seat belt.”
• Each year, over 450 people are killed in Alberta in motor vehicle collisions and over 20,000 are injured. Over 30% of the people killed were not wearing their seatbelts.
• Alberta’s collision statistics show unbelted occupants are three and a half times more likely to be injured than people who buckled up. Research and collision investigations have shown that seatbelts increase your chances of survival by over 50 per cent.
• In patient health-care costs are 50 per cent greater for unbelted crash victims than for those people who buckle up.
• Road Safety research has established that the effectiveness of seat belts in preventing death and serious injury to occupants of light duty motor vehicles involved in potentially fatal collisions ranges between 39% and 60%, depending on the vehicle type(s) and size(s) and occupant seating position. This means that for every 100 unbelted occupants who die in a given year, as many as 60 of them may have lived if they had simply worn their seat belt.
• According to the Alberta Motor Association “the use of a seat belt is perhaps the most effective way of reducing injury severity and likelihood of fatalities among vehicle occupants involved in a crash.
