The association between meteorological factors and road traffic injuries: a case analysis from Shantou city, China.

Jinghong Gao,Qiyong Liu,Yaogui Lu,Xiaobo Liu,Haixia Wu,Liping Li,Xiaojun Chen,Alistair Woodward

doi:10.1038/srep37300

Abstract

Few studies examined the associations of meteorological factors with road traffic injuries (RTIs). The purpose of the present study was to quantify the contributions of meteorological factors to RTI cases treated at a tertiary level hospital in Shantou city, China. A time-series diagram was employed to illustrate the time trends and seasonal variation of RTIs, and correlation analysis and multiple linear regression analysis were conducted to investigate the relationships between meteorological parameters and RTIs. RTIs followed a seasonal pattern as more cases occurred during summer and winter months. RTIs are positively correlated with temperature and sunshine duration, while negatively associated with wind speed. Temperature, sunshine hour and wind speed were included in the final linear model with regression coefficients of 0.65 (t = 2.36, P = 0.019), 2.23 (t = 2.72, P = 0.007) and −27.66 (t = −5.67, P < 0.001), respectively, accounting for 19.93% of the total variation of RTI cases. The findings can help us better understand the associations between meteorological factors and RTIs, and with potential contributions to the development and implementation of regional level evidence-based weather-responsive traffic management system in the future.

Highlights

Few studies examined the associations of meteorological factors with road traffic injuries (RTIs)
The results indicated that about 19.93% of the variation in the number of RTI cases could be accounted for by the combined influence of temperature, sunshine hour and wind speed
We found that more RTIs from the tertiary level hospital in Shantou city occurred during summer and winter months, and the number of cases each month rose with increasing temperature and sunshine hours, while wind speed was negatively correlated with RTIs

Summary

Introduction

Few studies examined the associations of meteorological factors with road traffic injuries (RTIs). Studies suggest that injuries, disabilities and deaths resulted from RTIs are costing 1%, 1.5% and 2% of the gross national product of low-, middle- and high-income countries, respectively (amounting to losses of about 518 billion dollars yearly)[9,10,11]. According to the National statistics yearbook of China, RTI-related deaths have decreased slightly after 2004 (Fig. 1), the total burden of losses is still very high (http://www.stats.gov.cn/tjsj/ndsj/). It is estimated that weather conditions can explain 5% of the variation in injury crashes[27,28], approximately 28% of all highway crashes, and 19% of all RTI-related fatalities[29]

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Discussion

Conclusion