Thailand has the second highest rate of road deaths in the world

[rooster59]

Thailand has the second highest rate of road deaths in the world



Surely coming as little surprise to anyone well acquainted with Thailand’s roads, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has found that the Kingdom has the second highest road deaths per capita than anywhere in the world.

36.2 people per 100,000 die on Thailand’s roads every year – alarmingly more than the 2.9 rate in the UK or 4.3 in Germany, although much lower than Libya, which boasts the dubious title of the worst country for road traffic fatalities, with 73.4 road deaths per 100,000 inhabitants.

India has the total most road fatalities.

Looking at Thailand in particular, it looks as though 2- or 3-wheeled motors – motorbikes and tuk tuks – far outweigh any other road user category for death rate:

Full story: http://whatsonsukhumvit.com/thailand-has-the-second-highest-rate-of-road-deaths-in-the-world/


-- (c) What's on Sukhumvit 2016-02-28

[Assurancetourix]

Difficult to include Libya which is a country where there is a total war since many years .

Many of the road accidents are of mines , shelling, bombing, snipers ...drones ...

Not exactly what happens in Thailand .

[Thailand]

One spot to go and they can claim number 1 hub in road kill.

[shirtless]

This is what happens when there is little money spent on roads and zero money spent on driver education.

[canopus1969]

Have to try harder, can't let Libya beat us

[canuckamuck]

Driver education should come in the form of penalties for moving violations. However they don't pull people over here unless they have a check stop organized. You can even undertake a cop or bust out all your head and tail lights and drive at night. No problems unless you end up in a crash.

[Don Mega]

Thing are on the up and up it seems. in 2013 Thailand was ranked #3.

[trogers]

Mai pen rai, Thailand...

[jpinx]

Really misleading old numbers from 2012. What's the kill-rate on 2-wheelers compared proportionately with other countries? Also the comment about the third world having far less "vehicles" shows that the figures are badly skewed. Commentary like "...although they have only half of the world’s vehicles, they have 90 percent of the world’s road deaths.... " does nothing to increase the accuracy of the perception.

Not to say that Thailand isn't very dangerous, but perhaps not much worse than other Asian or African countries.

Get into the details,,, http://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/road_safety_status/2015/en/

Page 11 of this will give some numbers http://www.news.mot.go.th/motc/portal/graph/transtat13.pdf

12million cars vs 19million "registered" motorcyles, but we all know that the real number is possibly double that.

Also interesting - - the WHO doubled the number of reported deaths for their survey. see page 14 here... http://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/road_safety_status/2015/Statistical_annex_GSRRS2015.pdf

Edited February 28, 2016 by jpinx

[ezzra]

Many times you see police men standing and doing nothing or targeting trucks or motor bikes

while other road offenders whizz by them with impunity, and if you happened to ge stopped

you either get away with being friendly and chummy with the cup in Thai, ending up with

b200 on the spot fine later at worst, or a banknote changes hands under the brown ticket

book and away you go.... how can anyone takes the police seriously when he knows that

they're a joke....

[KunMatt]

This is what happens when there is little money spent on roads and zero money spent on driver education.

I don't think the roads are a problem, in fact I think because a lot of the roads are decent tarmac'd 2 or more lane carriageways it means locals can do 80mph on a scooter with 5 people and no helmets and get wiped out by their or someone else's selfish stupid driving.

What they really need is educating about road safety, rules, hazards, drink driving and that being a selfish stupid bully on the roads can easily end your life out of nowhere. Also a government and police force that actual enforced the road rules would probably help a lot too, until then expect more stories of 20 people in 1 pickup being killed on a daily basis.

[Reigntax]

This is what happens when there is little money spent on roads and zero money spent on driver education.

More likely due to police ignoring unlicesed drivers, unroadworthy vehicles and sitting on their bums wayching all in front of them.

There are many countries in the world with far worse roads than in Thailand but I doubt there are many with the same driving mentality and tunnel vision ignorance towards other users.

Edited February 28, 2016 by Reigntax

[everett kendall]

Having driven in Saudi (which does not report it's figures) Thailand is better to drive in.

I had a vehicle there for 11 years, the place is hopeless.

[Lingba]

Finally a true hub

[Always18]

At the very heart of these statistics is the Thai casual disregard for the value of human life.

The death and injury toll on Thailands roads, building sites, in private houses and everywhere else will continue unchanged as long as Thais rely on lucky charms, blessings and all associated mumbo-jumbo rather than taking personal responsibility for their own actions.................and we all know what the chances are of that happening!

[PatOngo]

Difficult to feel sympathetic when the carnage continues year in, year out and the collective mentality remains unchanged.

[ttthailand]

The government don't care and that is the problem. How many police cars do you see on the streets pulling people over for breaking the law ? How many young kids do you see driving motorbikes ? Speeding, passing on double lines, running lights are so normal here it is unbelievable. Enforce the laws, add more cameras and speed traps, run adds on TV about safety, teach safety in schools etc etc ....

[Melyn]

Another report.

Tomorrow another crackdown will be announced.

Nothing will happen.

Another report.

Ad infinitum

[phitsanulokjohn]

And the real worrying aspect is the issue only appears to be a genuine concern to us the farangs living in a minority.

[Borzandy]

Driver education should come in the form of penalties for moving violations. However they don't pull people over here unless they have a check stop organized. You can even undertake a cop or bust out all your head and tail lights and drive at night. No problems unless you end up in a crash.

"Driver education should come in the form of penalties for moving violations." Sorry, we don't have driver education in Thailand. We don't need it to get our driving licence.

[WhizBang]

This is what happens when there is little money spent on roads and zero money spent on driver education.

You left out the #1 cause, zero law enforcement, which is also the root cause of 98% plus of Thailand's problems.

[giddyup]

Yet there are still people on this forum that claim Thailand is a perfectly safe place to ride a bike or drive a car, and no amount of factual evidence will convince them otherwise.

[arrowsdawdle]

Have to try harder, can't let Libya beat us

Now, now...you know that TAT bribed Libya to take first place.

[biggles45]

I understand that the Thai death toll only includes those who die at the scene? If they changed their method of recording stats they could be number 1 in a year.......go Thailand !!

[BlindMagician]

Every time I drive on a 2 or 3 lane road:

-sleepy guy drifts from his lane into mine, forcing my to evade.

-crazy guy steams up behind me within a meter, even when I'm boxed in with heavy traffic and can't pull over and hence get out of his way.

-shortcuts taken, counter to traffic flow.

-slow driver in the middle of three lanes, regardless of anything going on around him.

-accident wreckage post event, with drivers slowing down to take a good look.

-last second sharp turns across fast flowing traffic to get to the frontage.

-...and so it goes on.

Any drivers here will be all too familiar with this.

[prakhonchai nick]

Last night over a distance of 12kms on a very quiet road, I passed 4 motorbikes without rear lights which i suspect the drivers were unaware of With traffic coming towards me with headlights, often full on, it is sometimes difficult to spot motorbikes with no rear lights.

Considering most motorbike owners fill up their tanks once or twice a week, i would like to see PTT and Shell (probably the 2 largest petrol companies) automatically offer a rear light inspection when filling tanks, and having bulbs available for replacement (they cost less than 20baht). What a great public service that would be.

Edited February 28, 2016 by prakhonchai nick

[reggaebkk]

No way, number 1 has got to be Cambodia, it's just not recorded. A driving license is a license to kill in Cambodia, and road deaths are considered natural causes.

[hkt83100]

Yet there are still people on this forum that claim Thailand is a perfectly safe place to ride a bike or drive a car, and no amount of factual evidence will convince them otherwise.

Possibly because they have done some hundreds of thousands kms without accident, because their driving style is pre-cautious and they calculate the opponents correctly? I prefer driving here to the way in Germany, just because Thai drivers are predictable, while in Germany the war is on.

[Mousehound]

The death rate in Australia in the 6o's was pretty close to Thailand - in 1975 26.6 per 1000 and now 1bout 6 per thousand. The difference is very strict driving rules enforced. But it has taken a wealthy country nearly thirty years to really start to get on top of things. Inbdia only has a lower death rate because traffic is slow most of the time.

[HerbalEd]

This is what happens when there is little money spent on roads and zero money spent on driver education.

Not true. Thailand actually has very good roads overall ... esp. when compared to many other third-world countries. And the high Thai highway death rate ain't about driver education ... it's about reckless and selfish drivers.