The media reports the numbers and the events surrounding each road accident and yet the face of each accident was never more clear than in an emotional meeting with the “actual victims”.

The Road Safety Council held a meeting at the Victor Scott School last night for all of those affected by road fatalities or accidents in an attempt to reach the community on a very personal level.

The sentiment expressed in the meeting over and over again by the speakers was “they never thought about us when they risked their lives on the roads and now we are the victims!”

As the victims of these traffic incidents got up to speak, the tissues handed out by the school’s PTA became more and more depleted.

Derek James spoke what the tears on everybody’s face conveyed: “My son Derek junior lost his life at the bottom of our road and every time I turn left I have to think about him. But I’m vexed at him. I’m vexed he didn’t grow up. He had college applications ready and his brother who was already out there expected him to join him.

“I am almost 50 years old and I’ve had to make a lot of decisions, but the hardest decision I have ever had to make was to call my child who was abroad to tell him his brother and best friend is dead.

“The pain that the family has to suffer, the loss; time helps, but it doesn’t heal.”

Over and over again the message was for those on the road, who choose to speed, overtake in dangerous areas and ride in the “third lane” — they are taking their entire family’s life in their hands.

It is for this reason the Road Safety Council launched a campaign in January, which called for motorists to “Choose Life” and last night the chairman of the council, Dr. Christopher Johnson called the situation a public health epidemic. And that was nowhere more clear than at the meeting as mother after father after sister approached the microphone to try to explain to Bermuda the importance of every life lost by bad driving.

One mom spoke about her 18-year-old son who lost his life while she was off the Island.

She said: “I was in Spain to get a call that your child is in ICU fighting for his life and it takes ten hours to get to the island. On August 17 he lost his battle. My only consolation is that he was an organ donor and saved five lives, but he’s not with me.”

Road fatalities are not only about those driving, but also pedestrians, like Margaret Moore’s six-year-old daughter who was walking on a crossing outside a school when a car hit her. Ms Moore said: “I got up early to send her off to school with her brother and now he has to go to therapy because he blames himself. She was in the hospital for a day when the doctors told me she was brain dead and I had to pull the plug.”

The little girl’s primary teacher said: “This was a little girl who was doing all of the right things. She waited until told to go across the crossing. Next year she would have graduated from primary school with her classmates.”

Last to speak and perhaps the one to drive home the Road Safety Council’s message strongest, was Deborah Davis who lost her son nine months ago and her grandson is her only thing which keeps her going. She added: “He was a road fatality because he made a wrong choice. I had to blame my son, it was his bad choice.”

Many of those who spoke were concerned about the age people were given a licence, changes in legislation and a need for parents to stop being the children’s friend and to enforce respect for the road. Dr. Johnson said the Council would create a National Remembrance Day and a support group to help those families who have to deal with the after-effects, but hoped conveying the stories would help the community recognise the problem and help stop the deaths.