Road safety in the political agenda: the impact on road traffic injuries.
BACKGROUND
This paper aims at assessing the effectiveness of the package of road safety measures implemented after road safety was included in the political agenda in the year 2004 on the number of road traffic-injured people in Spain.


METHODS
An evaluation study was performed using an interrupted time-series design. The study population was people injured in road traffic crashes in Spain between 1 January 2000 and 31 December 2006. The road traffic crashes database of the General Directorate for Traffic was used. The dependent variable was the monthly number of people injured, stratified by sex, age, severity and type of road user. The explanatory variable (intervention) compared the post-intervention period (2004-6) with the pre-intervention period (2000-3). Quasi-Poisson regression models were adjusted, controlling for time trend and for seasonality.


RESULTS
Results show a reduction in the risk of being injured for both men (RR 0.91; 95% CI 0.87 to 0.95) and women (RR 0.89; 95% CI 0.85 to 0.94). Risk reductions were observed across all age groups and all road users, except for pedestrians.


CONCLUSIONS
The present study suggests that prioritising road safety reduces the number of people injured in road traffic collisions.
Novoa
Ana M
AM
Agència de Salut Pública de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
Pérez
Katherine
K
Santamariña-Rubio
Elena
E
Marí-Dell'Olmo
Marc
M
Cozar
Rogelio
R
Ferrando
Josep
J
Peiró
Rosana
R
Tobías
Aurelio
A
Zori
Pilar
P
Borrell
Carme
C
D000056:Accident Prevention / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D000063:Accidents, Traffic / Q000145:classification / Q000706:statistics & numerical data* / Q000639:trends; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D016001:Confidence Intervals; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D018986:Motor Vehicles / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D016012:Poisson Distribution; D011057:Politics; D012044:Regression Analysis; D040242:Risk Reduction Behavior; D017751:Safety Management / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence* / Q000379:methods; D017678:Sex Distribution; D013030:Spain / Q000453:epidemiology; D013996:Time and Motion Studies; D015599:Trauma Severity Indices; D016138:Walking / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000145:classification / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000517:prevention & control