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KUALA LANGAT: Road safety campaigns especially for motorcyclists and pillion riders should be intensified to reduce the accident rate fatalities involving the groups.
Universiti Putra Malaysia, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Department of Community Health, Safe Kids Malaysia executive director associate professor Dr Kulanthayan K. C. Mani said this was because motorcycists and pillion riders often took lightly the aspect of road safety especially over the wearing of safety helmets.
‘’This can be seen with the high fatal accident rates in the country each year involving motorcyclists and pillion riders.
‘’The cause of deaths of the motorcyclists and pillion riders normally resulted from not wearing safety helmets correctly or not wearing them,’’ he said after handing over 84 safety helmets to the pupils of Sekolah Jenis Kebangsaan Tamil (SJKT) Simpang Morib here today.
Also present was the school’s headmaster, K. Shanmugam.
Kulanthayan said the awareness campaign must also be escalated among parents because many among them were seen as quite unheedful on the safety of their children especially on the wearing of safety helmets.
He said the close proximity of schools from homes was also a major factor parents often neglected the aspect of wearing safety helmets by their children.
‘’I also personally see many parents especially on the fringes of towns who were lackadaisical on the safety of their children who ride motorcycles to schools without wearing safety helmets.
‘’They must realise the children are still young and the tissues in their heads are still soft. There is a major potential for an accident involving them to turn fatal,’’ he said, adding that the inability of parents to buy safety helmets for their children due to poverty was also another reason why the children did not wear safety helmets.
As such, he hoped the contributions of safety helmets to the pupils at the ceremony could create more awareness on the road safety aspect and the importance of wearing safety helmets. — Bernama
