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July 13, 2006
ROBERTSON REFUTES REGULATORY FAILURE CLAIMS
In a paper published in the Journal of Public Health Policy, a leading motor vehicle injury epidemiologist, Leon Robertson, has found fundamental errors in data and historical assertions contained in a book by a former GM employee that disparages air bag and other vehicle safety standards. The paper, Motor Vehicle Deaths: Failed Policy Analysis and Neglected Policy, notes that in the book Traffic Safety, Leonard Evans inferred that the slowed decline in US vehicle fatality rates in the 1990 s relative to other industrialized countries resulted from too much emphasis on vehicle factors. He claimed that Canada had the same vehicle mix but a lower fatality rate.
Robertson wrote that, "Actually, US death rates by make and model applied to Canadian vehicle sales indicates that Canada's death rate would be the same as the US if Canada had the same vehicle mix and annual miles driven. The US had much greater growth in sales of large SUVs and pickup trucks that are heavier and stiffer than passenger cars, contributing to excess deaths of other road users in collisions. They are also more unstable, contributing to excess deaths of their occupants in rollovers. Lack of policy regarding these vehicle characteristics is the primary reason for the attenuated decline in vehicular fatality rates."
For Robertson's table of vehicle make-models with lowest crash death rates, click on the Consumer Information box on the home page of this site.
Posted by MVHAP at July 13, 2006 03:22 PM