About 80% of Ghana’s road crash deaths are men – GhIE

About 80 per cent of people who die in road crashes in Ghana are men, a member of the Public Accountability Committee of the Ghana Institution of Engineering (GhIE), Ing. Dr Charles Kwarteng Asafo-Adjei, has said.

He described the trend as worrying, particularly as many of the victims are economically active.

“Most males are dying. About 80 per cent of the people who are dying are male,” he said on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show on Thursday, August 27.

Dr Asafo-Adjei was discussing road safety and public infrastructure following the release of GhIE’s latest infrastructure scorecard, which rated Ghana’s road safety E2, placing it among the country’s weakest-performing infrastructure areas.

He said road crashes were claiming an average of eight lives daily, translating to between 2,000 and 3,000 deaths annually.

According to him, the situation has worsened compared with 2001 to 2003, when Ghana recorded an average of about six road deaths per day.

He said the fatalities represented only part of the problem, as many survivors suffer serious injuries or permanent disabilities, placing additional pressure on healthcare facilities.

“The hospitals are under pressure. If you go to any of the wards and really want to understand, the evidence is in the hospitals,” he said.

Dr Asafo-Adjei urged authorities to make greater use of hospital and crash data to identify accident-prone areas and introduce targeted safety measures.

“If you pick data from the hospitals, they will tell you which accidents are occurring, where they are occurring and the black spots, especially in urban areas,” he said.

He called for stronger enforcement of traffic regulations, sustained road safety education and tighter control of vehicles and motorcycles in high-risk areas to reduce preventable deaths.

MyJoyOnline