New DOH ‘holiday’ problem: Surge in road crash injuries
Injuries from road crashes have spiked and even outnumbered injuries from firecrackers during the holiday season, becoming a cause of concern for the Department of Health (DOH).
Road crash injuries recorded in 10 sentinel hospitals from Dec. 21 to Jan. 5 totaled 1,384, double the 690 injuries reported in the same period a year ago. In contrast, injuries from fireworks totaled 720 during the 15-day period, 14 percent down from the 834 cases a year ago.
“The [firework-related injuries] is still a problem as long as there are children losing their fingers. It’s still a public health problem. But the 1,300 cases of road crash injuries that is a 100-percent increase from last year, this is a public health problem. We need to fix this,” Health Secretary Teodoro Herbosa said in a briefing on Monday.
Nearly half or 47 percent of the road crash injuries involved young people aged 15 to 29. Most of the cases involved motorcycle riders who were not wearing helmets or safety accessories.
Safety not a priority
Of the 1,384 cases, 989 involved motorcycles and 1,188 of the victims were not wearing safety accessories, which may prove that road safety is not a priority among some motorcycle riders.
The DOH also reported 10 fatalities, with seven of them motorcycle riders, six of whom were not wearing helmets. The other fatalities were pedestrians, it added.
In 171 cases of the incidents, the victims were driving under the influence of alcohol.
“Not wearing a helmet, not wearing a seatbelt, drinking before driving, reckless driving, speeding, many are in a hurry—these are the causes of our road crash injuries,” Herbosa said.
The health secretary also reminded the public to remain safe throughout the year, not just during the holidays.
‘Bad behavior’
Herbosa said the DOH is constantly monitoring road crash incidents through its online electronic injury surveillance system.
“All my life as a trauma surgeon, this is what we treated. The so-called ‘society’s bad behavior.’ Drinking, driving, then they crashed. They end up in an emergency room or an operating room of a trauma hospital,” he said.
“This ‘Ligtas [Safe] Christmas’ campaign showed us that in only 10 hospitals, there were 1,384 total cases,” Herbosa noted. “Imagine if you counted all the thousands of hospitals. There would probably be so many [cases of road crash injuries].”
The secretary also vowed to use a portion of the DOH budget to reduce the number of fatalities from road crash injuries.
Herbosa instructed hospital directors to improve postcrash response by ensuring that medical care is administered immediately after a road crash.
He also stressed that preventing road crash incidents is a multiagency effort.
“Every Filipino riding a motorcycle, let’s say a 25-year-old going to work, if that person dies, who will suffer? His family, his wife, his child who lost a parent. So, it has effects not only on your health, but also on the socioeconomic [factors],” Herbosa said.
