There are an average of 50 serious head injuries every year in Bermuda, despite the Island's small population, Road Safety Chairman Dr. Joseph Froncioni told Hamilton Rotarians yesterday.

The cost of these injuries is substantial, he added, with a serious injury requiring an average five day stay in the hospital's Intensive Care Unit (ICU) at a cost of $3,500 per day.

Yet, residents continue to engage in a variety of reckless behaviour on the roads - riding with helmets unfastened, using old or damaged helmets, driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs - and then term the dangerous crashes which occur as a result, "accidents".

Traffic crashes should no longer be referred to as "accidents", Dr. Froncioni said because they are often entirely preventable.

When people refer to them as accidents however, they become complacent to the carnage on the roads and choose to look upon crashes as "acts of God", he said.

Dr. Froncioni gave the example of two news stories which ran in Canada. In one, five teenagers were killed in a drinking and driving incident. In the other, two children died from meningitis.

While the first story hit the papers for only one day, the second commanded front page attention for weeks and lead to an expensive Government response.

Preventable road crashes come closer to the definition of a "disease" than that of an "accident", Dr. Froncioni said.

Despite Bermuda's grim road crash statistics - there have been eight fatal crashes to date this year - Dr. Froncioni said people often view risks emotionally rather than rationally.

For example, while many people fear flying, the risk of injury is 2,000 times higher riding a motorcycle than flying in a plane.

Yet, Bermuda continues to allow young teenagers to drive motorcycles although they have little or no experience.

This must change, Dr. Froncioni said, promising that Bermuda will soon move to a graduated licensing scheme which would see a period of 24 months pass before new drivers would receive a full driver's licence.

Government is in the process of contemplating a variety of new road safety initiatives, he added.

And he said there are many simple ways to reduce crash incidents on Bermuda's roads - such as recently enacted seat belt legislation.

Dr. Froncioni said seat belts may only prevent one death per year, but enforcing seat belt use is cheap and effective in preventing costly facial injuries as a result of crashes.

He also hopes to see helmet regulations tightened up and stressed helmets more than three years old should simply not be used because they are ineffective.

Keeping motorcycle headlights on during the day reduces the occurrence of collisions 30 percent, he pointed out.

And, sadly, 60 percent of collisions can still be tied to driving while under the influence.

"The culture of driving in Bermuda has deteriorated," he said.