Another child driveway death. Most are preventable for less than the cost of a WOF.

We have the solution. Just not the drive to implement the solution across the board.

Another child run over in my hometown and killed. Coming just one month after another driveway death in Gore. Also a 3-year-old.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/police-release-name-of-3-year-old-boy-who-died-in-northland-driveway-accident/NSJFQF7PSRH2XB6ZU3DSD3SV3A/

How much is it worth, in dollars, to save the life of several NZ toddlers each year? To prevent them dying needlessly?

It’s a question I think about every time I read or treat a child who’s backed over by a car in a driveway. About 6 kids a year are killed in NZ like this, and 12 others hospitalised, often with major (lifelong) injuries.

In the 18 years I’ve been working in ED, I’ve cared for several kids involved in bad driveway injuries. Examined them with my own hands, lifted them onto the CT scanner table, put tubes between their ribs to treat collapsed lungs, and managed fractured livers and spleens. Some lived, some didn’t.

You could save many of them (not all, but many…) through a simple bit of technology. A back-up sensor that tells you if there’s something in your way. A $14-70 piece of kit on Trademe. A simple DIY installation, and a cheap addition on a new vehicle. (Standard on some, but not all, new vehicles.)

Should it be standard in cars sold in NZ? Of course. Should it be subsidised at cost for those who can’t afford it? Yes again.

Our government leaders are penny smart and pound foolish.

But they don’t have to be.

Start with the cost of a single human life (currently measured at $12.5 million by NZTA). Up that a little bit because we’re talking about kids dying who would’ve lived 70 more productive years. Add in the cost of hospitalisations, and long-term care for some kids injured. And more for the traumatic brain injuries (which range from $20,000 to $1.7million dollars a year depending on severity and neurosurgical and rehab and ongoing care costs). Add in the psychic trauma and loss knowing you’ve run over or killed a child, and the costs increase. We’re currently at about 1 injured kid a month. And 1 killed child every other month. It’s hideous. And largely preventable.

Even if you cared nothing about human suffering (though you should), the financial costs alone should make your stomach turn.

It makes you wonder why continue to do nothing, when we know what works.

#simeonbrown #transport #nzpol

Oh, and before you say personal responsibility, please realise that so many of us have had near misses. Even car guru and editor Clive Matthew-Wilson almost ran over a kid in a supermarket car park. But he says the parking sensor saved the day. And the child’s life.

https://www.1news.co.nz/2024/04/29/driveway-tragedies-call-for-mandatory-safety-measures-in-cars/

Surely most of us with kids or around kids have been there: We looked in the rear view mirror, and the driver- and passenger-side mirrors. Saw nothing but still almost hit a kid as ther ran around, chased a ball, or rode a bike. A lucky miss.

Toddlers are frequently too low to be seen in mirrors, and often dart out faster than we can see them. But not fast enough to evade a parking sensor. The idea that we have cheap technologies available on new cars makes it downright crazy that we don’t mandate “safer pick” or 5-star rated vehicles as the minimum safety standard for all new vehicles sold.

Surely someday we’ll implement that solution. But just not today. And in another month or two, another child will die.

-Gary Payinda