500 children die daily on the world’s roads, says UNICEF report
21 February 2025
Over 180,000 children are dying on the world’s roads, according to a new UNICEF report supported by the FIA Foundation.
The report, ‘Protecting Young Lives: Global Status Report on Child and Adolescent Road Safety’ highlights the critical issue of road traffic crashes as a leading cause of death and injury among children and adolescents worldwide. The new analysis of the World Health Organization’s last Global Status Report on Road Safety was undertaken by the George Institute for Global Health and launched at the Fourth Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety in Marrakech, Morocco.
A total of 500 children aged 0–19 years die from road traffic injuries every day, according to the report, with more than 90 per cent of the burden affecting low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The report assesses the global status of child and adolescent road safety, providing an overview of the burden of child and adolescent road injury and identifying gaps in actions needed to advance road safety. It highlights risk factors that make young road users particularly susceptible to traffic-related injuries and recommends Safe System policies to promote a system-wide change, emphasizing shared responsibility and minimizing crash impact forces.
The report is intended for policymakers, practitioners, NGOs, and global advocates, providing them with the knowledge and tools to prioritize and improve child and adolescent road safety. The report emphasizes the imperative of protecting our youngest and most vulnerable road users and calls for coordinated global efforts to create safer and healthier roads, environments and mobility for children and adolescents.
Saul Billingsley, Executive Director of the FIA Foundation, said: “It is shocking that a child still dies every three minutes on our roads. This report is an important contribution to understanding the unacceptable level of child road death and injuries and how to embed the Safe System approach to protect our most vulnerable.”