Amount of serious injuries on Irish roads is almost double official figures, research finds

The number of people seriously injured in road traffic accidents on Irish Road is almost twice the figure previously recorded, research undertaken by the Road Safety Authority (RSA) has found.

Using hospital data as well as garda figures, the research shows that over the period 2014 to 2022, 18,021 casualties were hospitalised with injuries from road traffic crashes.

The Irish Independent has reported that over the same period, the number of seriously injured casualties recorded by An Garda Síochána (AGS) and reported in official statistics by the RSA was 10,687.

The news comes as concerns are raised about the level of fatalities on Irish roads so far in 2024, with a number of slowdown initiatives undertaken by gardaí. 

The data found a significant discrepancy in the number of cyclist injuries, in particular, at between two and three times the rate of garda reporting.

The research found that Cyclists accounted for 27pc of hospitalised casualties and 18pc of garda-logged serious injuries.

Between 1 January 2022 and 24 September 2023, the total number of e-scooter users injured was 51, three were fatally injured, and 48 e-scooter users were seriously injured. During the same period, 12 other road users were injured in a collision involving an e-scooter, one fatally and 11 seriously.

The research was conducted by the RSA in conjunction with the HSE and Trinity College Dublin. It followed recommendations of the European Commission to all member states to formally report on serious injuries using hospital data, as a complement to police data.

According to the RSA, the absolute number of hospitalised casualties and garda-logged serious injuries overall increased up to 2019, decreased during 2020, and continued to increase in 2022.

The number of hospitalised casualties and AGS serious injuries recorded in 2022 was the highest of the period.

"The discrepancy between hospital and police data has been observed internationally and can be more pronounced when looking at cyclist serious injuries. This was the case in Ireland, following the findings of this research project, where 2.4 times more cyclists were hospitalised following a road traffic collision, compared to numbers recorded in official figures recorded by An Garda Síochána and reported by the RSA," the study notes. 

"There are many reasons why hospital figures are higher than police-reported figures - if an incident was not formally reported to police, or if a serious injury only became apparent in the days immediately following a collision. For cyclists specifically, this new Irish study noted that 63% of all cyclists hospitalised sustained their injuries in single cyclist collisions, where no other vehicle was involved," the RSA study reports.