PARENTS and drivers transporting children under three years old on a public road, must ensure the toddlers are securely strapped into a car seat or face fines.
Except for buses, minibuses and midibuses operating for reward, drivers will be fined if caught with toddlers on the loose.
The Department of Transport has published the amendments to the National Road Traffic Regulations 2000 under the National Road Traffic Act, 1996, in response to the alarmingly high rate of road accidents and gaps in legislation regarding travel safety for children.
The regulation came into effect on 1 May, six months after publication, to afford road users time to acquire proper SABS approved child safety seats.
While road safety activists and trauma doctors are applauding the stricter laws, the issue of seat belts in the South African context are complex.
Third world countries battle poverty to the extent that basic survival is a challenge and the cost of an approved car seat can rise to the thousands.
Even second hand car seats are on average high above the affordability of the majority of passengers.
Sad statistics
But the grumbling about the costs must be weighed up against the country’s staggering number of road fatalities.
According to the World Health Organisation, 13 768 traffic fatalities were reported in South Africa in 2009, while Arrive Alive says about 150 000 are injured in car crashes annually.
Seriously trauma such as paralysis, brain damage, severe burns and dismemberment is common.
According to the Medical Research Council (MRC), road accidents are the leading cause of injury deaths among under-fives in South Africa, and in most of these children were not buckled up.
Research by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the United States found strapping infants into car seats reduces the risk of death in car crashes by 71% and in toddlers between one and four years old by 54%.
Booster seats cut the risk of serious injury by 45% for children aged between four and eight years compared to seat belt use alone.
In a 50 kilometres an hour crash, a four-year-old weighing 20kg would hit the first solid object with a force of 400kg.
