48 Percent of Children Deaths Caused by Traffic Accident

`Let’s wipe off the disgrace of the No. 1 ratio of children death among OECD members. `

`Save children from the dark corners of traffic accident. `

Korean Safety Education Association (KSEA) and Korea Non-life Insurance Association (KNIA) held the `forum on the safety education for children` at the conference room of the main building of Samsung Fire Insurance Seoul on the 3rd attended by some 200 persons of students and those from related institutions like the Prime Minister’s Office and the police agency.

According to KNIA, the death ratio of children from 1 to 14 years old is 25.6 persons out of 100,000 persons, which is the highest rate among 26 OECD members. Moreover, 47.5 percent of the deaths are resulted from traffic accident, which makes the traffic accident of children serious social problem.

The number of Korea’s infant death from traffic accident is steadily decreasing to 12,738 persons in 2001 from 21,328 persons in 1990, which is not satisfactory yet.

Yoon Sun-Hwa director of research and planning section in KSEA addressed, “we should improve the operation process and enforce the education of parents and instructors in order to activate the traffic safety education for children. ”

There came the voice for the fundamental revise of regulations. Kim Soo-Kon Chief of Traffic Safety Division of the Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MCT) said, “the school health law should be revised to make schools set up plans for the traffic safety education, and related institutions of the government should cooperate to develop specific means and contents. ”

Park Jin-Hyun head of traffic safety division in police agency announced, “traffic violations and accidents are still as they were in spite of the control and the instruction of the police. As one of the 5-year plans, policemen, who have special knowledge and field experiences, will organize and operate the `Circuit Education Team for Children Traffic Safety` aiming at the children of kindergartens and elementary schools. ”

Kim Gwang-Rye leader of family welfare team in Seoul City said, “Seoul city is promoting `general measure for making Seoul safe for children` from last year for the first time among local governments, as it judged the safety measure for children is emergent. ”

On the contrary, Hur Ok leader of Children Traffic Safety Institute pointed, “current educational system has no traffic safety education program available for children, and the education is rather a formality far from experience. ”

Do-Young Kim nirvana1@donga.com