After four deaths in the first four months of the year and 19 serious accidents in the same period, road safety remains a serious concern, according to Police.

Added to those numbers were 174 slight injury collisions and 232 damage-only crashes — statistics that are “impacting on the community in many ways”.

“The Bermuda Police Service continues to progress its Road Safety Strategy as one of its priority areas of policing with some encouraging results when collisions are considered in totality as a performance indicator,” said head of Roads Policing Unit, Inspector Robert Cardwell.

“However, this is less encouraging when collisions are broken down into categories and are considered in context.”

Speed, inattention, impairment and various combinations of these factors are the main causes and frequent factors of collisions in all categories, added Insp Cardwell.

Serious injury collisions are classified as such when the injury requires admittance to the ICU or is an injury that has resulted in the loss of a limb, paralysis, head or neck injury, internal injury and any other injury that requires an extensive period of rehabilitation, explained Ins Cardwell.

“The collisions occurring on the roads in Bermuda are impacting on the community in many ways and this is a social concern.

“The negative impacts suffered where life has been lost is on the family through the grief that this causes, but also in the loss of earnings and contribution to the family dynamic and hardship in some cases follow.

“In addition, serious injury, slight injury and damage collision categories impacts on the cost of motor insurance and the manner of driving or riding in most cases that have resulted in these collisions impacts on feelings of fear suffered by other road users.

“We continue to encourage the motoring public to slow down, give your driving and riding your full attention and whenever socialising have a plan to get home reducing the risk you bring on yourself but also other road users.”