Traffic casualty rate in Belgium above European average

The EU will have a hard time realising its target of halving the number of traffic-related deaths by the year 2020, writes De Standaard. In 2014, about 25,700 people died on European roads, only 1% less than the previous year. Belgium scores below average.

"It's sad and hard to accept that almost seventy Europeans die on our roads every day, with many more being seriously injured. The figures published today should be a wake-up call,” says EU transport commissioner Violeta Bulc (pictured).

The EU has an objective to cut the number of traffic fatalities in 2010 (31,500) in half by 2020. The provisional figures for 2014, however, give little cause for optimism, with 25,700 people killed in traffic accidents, 300 fewer than in 2013.

In Belgium, the number of traffic-related deaths has decreased by about 18% since 2010, but the downward trend appears to have slowed down since last year. In 2014, there were 50.5 fatalities on Belgian roads per 1 million inhabitants, or a casualty rate of 64, which is higher than the European average. Only eight European countries score worse than Belgium, with Latvia at the bottom of the list with 105.

The EU member states with the lowest traffic fatality rates are Malta, the Netherlands, Sweden and the United Kingdom, with fewer than 30 deaths per 1 million.