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home / centre for automotive safety research / Publications / List / Details Publication Details| Title | Children in cars: Belts, seats an capsules | | Authors | Simpson DA | | Year | 1990 | | Type | Presentation | | Abstract | When the road toll is considered, I suppose that we all feel special concern over the children who are every year killed or crippled as pedestrians, pedal cyclists, or passengers in cars. As a group, the 0-14 aged victims are not the most numerous: the peak in deaths and injuries is of course in young male adults. But accidents to children do concern us very greatly, if for no other reason than that so many of these accidents ought to be preventable. In our current series of 34 fatal head injuries in children aged from one month to 14 years, child car passengers amounted to one third of all cases, rather more than pedal cyclists, rather fewer than child pedestrians. Very commonly, the car crashes that kill or cripple children are not the high-velocity crashes that kill adults: they are relatively less severe crashes, that cause very severe injuries because babies and children are very vulnerable, have small bodies and are easily thrown around. They have relatively large heads, and are apt to hit things head first. They have thin skulls: a one year old baby's skull is about a quarter the thickness of an adult's skull, and will dent or shatter. For all these reasons it is imperative that we should do everything possible to make car travel as safe as possible, and particularly to secure small people from being thrown around inside cars, or ejected out of them. | | Publisher | Road Accident Research Unit | | Publisher City | Adelaide | | Sponsor | Office of Road Safety, Transport SA | | Conference Name | Road Safety Forum | | Conference Location | Adelaide, Australia | | Conference Date | October 1990 | | Page Count | 2 | | Notes | available from CASR library on request |
| Reference | | Simpson DA (1990). Children in cars: Belts, seats an capsules. Road Safety Forum. |
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