
 Originally Posted by 
cafe latte
					 
				 
				........., but I do believe this and other safety measures on new cars do save lives.
Chris
			
		 
	 
 They certainly do, but insurance and other statistics show that accident and injury rates have very little to do with the safety equipment fitted to the car. The colour of the car seems to be more relevant. In fact, the very highest accident and injury/death rates are seen in cars that have the highest safety ratings. Mind you, they are also the cars that have very high performance and attract car thieves!
All this points to the driver being the highest influence on accident, death and injury rates, with part of the driver effect being the driver's choice of car. And over the top of this is the simple fact that drivers with alcohol or other drug impairment are over-represented in all accidents by factors as high as twenty times more likely.
Consequently, I conclude that while modern design will prevent injury and death once you have an accident, the probability of having it in the first place is hardly affected directly by vehicle design, primary safety improvements being largely counterbalanced by the higher speeds and acceleration possible. 
Accident rates have been going down virtually ever since records started, and although vehicle design may have had a small influence on this, I believe it has been mainly due to improved roads, seat belts (not airbags) and much better compliance by drivers, including, but not restricted to drink driving.
John
				
			 
			
		 
			
				
			
			
				John
JDNSW
1986 110 County 3.9 diesel
1970 2a 109 2.25 petrol
			
			
		 
	
Bookmarks