the driver's handbook

22
R O A d S A f E t y
Seatbelts
Wearing a seatbelt doubles your chances of surviving a serious
crash yet despite the benefits shown by road safety research,
time and time again too few people buckle up their seatbelt.
Every year about 27 drivers and passengers killed and a further
74 seriously injured are not wearing a seatbelt when they are in
a vehicle involved in a crash. Many of these deaths and injuries
would have been prevented or be less severe if they were wearing
a seatbelt. Some of these passengers were children.
Statistics show that nearly 60 child passengers aged 0-16 years
are killed or injured in South Australia each year – nearly a third of
these are aged 0-7 years.
The Driver’s Handbook
A restraint or seatbelt will not work at all if it hasn’t been
correctly fastened. Buckle up – and you double your chance
of surviving a crash.
A further 365 sustain minor injuries every year. Just over 45% of
passenger deaths and a quarter of those seriously injured in this
age group were not wearing a seatbelt at the time of the crash. The
severity of injury received in crashes, especially injuries to the face
and head, is significantly lower if occupants wear their seatbelts.
Wearing a seatbelt can be a life or death decision – both for you
and your passengers. Seatbelts should be worn even if you are
only travelling a short distance because most road crashes happen
close to home. For someone not wearing a seatbelt, a crash at
40km/h is like falling from a two storey building onto concrete.
Passengers not wearing seatbelts can kill or seriously injure others
in the car if, for example, the driver has to brake suddenly.
By law, drivers must ensure that they and any other passenger
in the vehicle are wearing their seatbelt, regardless of their age.
However, passengers are still accountable, as both drivers and
passengers aged 16 years and over can be fined if they fail to wear
a seatbelt. Demerit points also apply.
While airbags help reduce injury, they are no substitute for wearing
seatbelts. The airbag increases the benefit of a seatbelt. Australian
tests have shown that an airbag reduces the chance of a serious
head injury by at least 50%.