AAA welcomes road trauma registry funding

The Australian Automobile Association (AAA) has announced its backing for the Australian Trauma Registry, a government database of injuries and fatalities incurred as a result of traffic accidents.

"The AAA and the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons have for some time been advocating for the Government to make this very important investment in road safety," said AAA Chief Executive Michael Bradley.

According to Bradley, the funding announced by the government earlier this month "will go a long way towards helping all levels of government better understand road trauma and to take steps to reduce it."

The Australian Trauma Registry is an operational adjunct to the National Road Safety Strategy (NRSS) established in 2011, and government funding appears to have been in response to lobbying by the AAA in the month or so before the announcement was made.

A shortcoming of the NRSS to date has been the lack of accurate data for formulating tactics and strategies to reduce the road toll by over 30 per cent by 2020. This has been the principal goal for the NRSS. Best-guess data by the NRSS calculates serious injuries to number around 625 a week, nationally. The Australian Trauma Registry is expected to furnish more accurate figures.

Road fatalities have begun to trend upwards since early 2015, the AAA advises. Year to date figures as of September 2016 shows the statistics rose from 1187 for the same period in 2015 to 1273 this year.
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