Commission supports Kidsafe awareness campaign

The Commission recently attended the launch of the Kidsafe Qld low-speed vehicle run-over awareness and prevention TV campaign featuring former Wallaby Brendan Cannon and the NRMA Insurance Broncos. At the launch, Brendan spoke of the shock, pain and heartache experienced after he accidentally ran over his young son Sam in the family driveway. Professor Roy Kimble also presented new research on this preventable and common injury. The Commission has been an active stakeholder in supporting research and awareness into low-speed run-overs through the provision of data from the Child Death Register to relevant organisations such as Kidsafe Qld and also within the Child Death Annual Reports.

Approximately 160 children are accidentally run over in Queensland every year. Tragically, about 4 children do not survive the accident. Low-speed vehicle run-over (LSVRO) is a term used to describe incidents where a pedestrian is injured or killed by a slow-moving vehicle in a traffic or non-traffic area. Most of these incidents usually involve younger children (between the ages of 1 and 4 years) and occur in the driveway of their own home. Drivers tend to be members of their family, with vehicles reversing at the time of the incident. Importantly, it’s not just 4WD’s responsible for the majority of driveway accidents, with ordinary passenger vehicles accounting for most driveway accidents in which children are injured. There were 15 deaths (12 males and 3 females) in Queensland between 2004 and 2008 as a result of LSVRO. Most of these deaths (13 out of 15) occurred on private property, with parents being the drivers of the vehicle in 11 of the fatalities (Griffin et al, 2011).

Further information on the Commission’s involvement in LSVRO research and prevention activities can be found on our website.

More information (including the new advertisement featuring the NRMA Insurance Broncos) on the Kidsafe campaign can be found on the Kidsafe website.

Last Updated: August 22, 2011

Print this page