No cars, no collision: Road accident instances fall drastically amid US lockdown
Several cities in the United States are under a lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic. And while this has already begun taking a toll on the country's economy, there are certain benefits to people staying at home, besides the obvious safety against the disease. A drastic fall in cases of road accidents is one such benefit with a number of US cities reporting a heartening fall in such instances.
Quartz has reported that San Francisco, a city where an average of 260 emergency calls were made each week in 2019, only had 110 such calls to report road accidents between March 17 and 23. This is the lowest for any week in the last 17 years. With most office spaces shut, roads are quite empty which has resulted in a downward spiral in instances of road accidents.
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Other major cities like Seattle and Los Angeles too have reported almost half the number of emergency calls reporting road accidents between March 17 and 23 than before.
An estimated 40,000 people are killed in road accidents across the US every year. And although the coronavirus death toll is expected to rise further in the coming weeks, the resulting shutdown caused by it are saving lives on the roads, say many. A comparison between the two is hardly fair but there is still no denying that fewer cars on the roads and freeways have managed to bring down injuries and deaths caused by road accidents.
Fewer cases of road accidents also helps medical and emergency personnel focus on providing better care to other patients, including those with coronavirus or Covid-19 as it is officially referred to. At a time when medical infrastructure is under enormous stress the world over, this is a positive sign that many are willing to accept.
