Accident statistics are manipulated

Creation date: 04 January 2010

Michael de Broglio: Every year the department of transport announces that road deaths are down. Reporters attribute this to the minister, etcetera.
 
In fact, in 11 years the road death toll has doubled in South Africa. So has December become a safer period or is the media being fed misleading figures?

This is my guess: Year after year the department changes the reporting periods. It announces and takes credit for an early figure that does not include accidents not reported to it yet by various police stations and people who will still die in hospital from injuries sustained in accidents (which make the toll about 30% higher on average).

The next year it compares the real figure of the year before with the figures not including the above data and voila! we once again have a reduction.

Strangely, media releases from previous years do not remain on the department's website. It has not removed its January 2009 release.

This is the part you will enjoy: Having just reported that 1348 people died in the 2008 festive season - at the time it announced 937 deaths, and that from December 1 to January 5 (a longer period than this year).

Now, it announces 1050 people died in December 2009, less than the year before.

If last year's statement was true, 80 or so more people died in December last year than the year before.

Sadly, the reality is 2008's release was not true and nor is the latest one.

Source: http://www.timeslive.co.za/opinion/letters/article248991.ece