site.btaBulgaria Reports 12% Decline of Road Casualties

Brussels, April 10 (BTA correspondent Nizkolay Jeliazkov) - Between 2010 and 2017, the number of people killed in road accidents in Bulgaria dropped by 12 per cent, according to European Commission statistics unveiled Tuesday. It is a lasting decline with road casualties going down to 96 per 1 million last year from 105 in 2010.

The decline was by 4 per cent from 2016 to 2017.

Bulgaria and Romania remain the only EU countries reporting over 80 road casualties per 1 million population.

EU-wide, the decline was 20 per cent between 2010 and 2017, and 2 per cent from 2016 and 2017.

The European Commission points out that the aim of slashing casualties by a half between 2010 and 2020 will be very hard to achieve.

Statistics shows that 135,000 people were seriously injured in road accidents in 2017 - mostly pedestrians, cyclists and bikers. Road accidents lead to costs of some 120 billion euro a year.