Crashes kill and injure too many Latin Americans

Latin America’s high rate of road traffic deaths is giving major cause for concern. Data collated by the International Automobile Federation for nine of Latin America’s nations reveal an average of 16 deaths/100,000 inhabitants caused by road crashes. The information was collated for Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay, revealing that there were 61,926 deaths from road crashes in the countries in 2013. Brazil’s fatal crash rate is particularly high with some 40,160 people being killed in road crashes, a rate of 20/100,000 inhabitants. Ecuador and Paraguay also have high fatal crash rates of 17/100,000 inhabitants, some 2,570 and 1,117 deaths respectively. Uruguay saw 16/100,000 inhabitants killed in crashes, with 567 fatalities. Argentina, Colombia and Peru had 13/100,000 inhabitants killed in crashes with fatality rates of 5,187, 6,000 and 4,037 respectively. The data showed Chile’s roads to be the safest of the Latin American countries studied, with 9/100,000 inhabitants killed in crashes and a total of 1,623 fatalities in 2013.