oa Road safety and traffic medicine in Iran: Achievements and challenges

Road traffic injuries found to be the second rank of Years of Life Lost (YLL) and third rank of Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALY) in Iran based on Global Burden of Disease 2010. The number of annual fatalities, which had been on the rise for several decades, reached to the maximum number of over 27500 deaths in 2005. The number decreased to 23000 in 2010 and less than 18000 in 2013. The reduction in number of deaths happened despite a four-fold increase in number of motor vehicles. Some of the interventions that might be contributing to this achievement include the following: a) the new traffic law passed in 2010 that replaced the previous one dating back to 1968. Heavier penalties for major offences like: speeding, driving under the influence and dangerous driving are considered in the new law; b) stricter law enforcement by traffic polices(1); c) mass media campaign for traffic injury prevention (1); d) using fixed speed camera systems and laser speed guns; e) universal coverage of hospital treatment costs for all traffic injuries by Ministry of Health and Medical Education(2); and f) graduated driving license. On the other side, there are areas that need to be improved, including: a) driving behavior of both public and private drivers; b) driving under influence of drugs specially among public vehicle drivers (3,4) c) motorcycle riding behavior with special emphasis on helmet use (5); d) medical and psychological fitness to drive examinations; e) vehicle safety specifically for cars manufactured within the country; f) transportation engineering with emphasis on expansion of railroads and safe highways. References: 1) Soori H1, Royanian M, Zali AR, Movahedinejad A. Road traffic injuries in Iran: the role of interventions implemented by traffic police. Traffic Injury Prevention. 2009 Aug; 10(4):375-8. 2) Karim H, Mohammadi M, Bazargan-Hejazi S, Ahmadi A. Removing the economic burden of road traffic injuries from patients: a successful model. Journal of Injury and Violence Research. 2015 Jul; 7(2): 95-96. 3) Motevalian SA, Jahani M, Mahmoodi M. Driving under influence of opiates in heavy vehicle drivers of Iran in 2001. Hakim; 2004, 7(1): 1-8. 4) Majdzadeh R, Feiz-Zadeh A, Rajabpour Z, Motevalian A, Hosseini M, Abdollahi M, Ghadirian P. Opium consumption and the risk of traffic injuries in regular users: a case-crossover study in an emergency department. Traffic Injury Prevention. 2009 Aug;10(4):325-329. 5) Motevalian SA, Asadi-Lari M, Rahimi H, Eftekhar M. Validation of a Persian Version of Motorcycle Rider Behavior Questionnaire. Annals of Advances in Automotive Medicine. 2011 Oct:91-98.