Data released by the Iranian Legal Medicine Organization reveal 7,500 people lost their lives in road mishaps in five months ending Aug. 22.
The death rate is 1% higher, compared with the corresponding period of last year.
In the fiscal 2018-19, the national road death toll hit 17,183, showing a 1.2% rise year-on-year.
A comparative look at LMO charts shows that during the first five months of the current fiscal year, 7,561 people lost their lives in road accidents nationwide, which was 7,489 in the same period of last year.
Infamous for the high road death rate, Fars tops the provinces with 612 deaths, followed by Khorasan Razavi at 543 and Tehran with 542 deaths.
A closer look at the numbers shows the road fatality rate in Fars Province was down 6.1% compared with the period of last year, which dropped from 652 to 612.
Figures in Khorasan Razavi, however, show an 8.8% rise, from 499 road deaths reported last year to 543 this year.
The death rate in Tehran registered a 3.2% decline, from 560 a year ago to 542.
Ilam, Chaharmahal-Bakhtiari and Kohgilouyeh-Boyerahmad provinces had the lowest fatality rates respectively with 51, 92 and 104 recorded deaths in the five months.
Among the three, the death rate in Kohgilouyeh-Boyerahmad shows a noticeable16.9% increase. During the same period of last year, 89 road deaths were reported in the western province.
However, Ilam and Chaharmahal-Bakhtiari reported a respective decline of 8.9% and 25.8% in the number of road fatalities.
In the year before, 56 and 124 people lost their lives in road accidents in Ilam and Chaharmahal-Bakhtiari respectively.
Fatal Factors
Traffic Police have announced that sleep deprivation, fatigue, speeding, overtaking from the wrong side, running a red light, talking on the cellphone, text messaging and munching behind the wheel, as well as low-quality vehicles and roads, are the main killers on the roads.
Needless to say, motorcyclists and their dangerous driving habits also contribute to the high number of road victims.
According to an LMO's report published this week, which relates to the last fiscal year (ended March 2019), 21.8% of the road fatalities during the year-long period pertained to motorcyclists, which accounts for 3,700 of the total number of 17,183 road deaths recorded during the yearlong period.
Injury to the head was the leading cause of death in fatal motorcycle crashes which, according to Traffic Police, was mainly because many bikers do not wear helmets, especially during the summer months.
According to the Traffic Police's August report, more than 11.65 million motorcycles are plying the streets nationwide, of which over 20% are in Tehran.
Studies show that in the capital, 47% of motorcyclists use two-wheelers to commute from home to work, 29% use motorcycles as a means of earning a livelihood, while the rest use it in their leisure time.
Because of Tehran’s heavy traffic snarls, many commuters who need to get somewhere quickly prefer to take a motorcycle instead of a taxi.
Lamenting the stubborn motorcyclists and their dangerous driving habits on the roads, Morteza Alviri, a member of Tehran City Council, called Tehran Traffic Police to make the rules a tad stricter for those breaching the rules.
"There are over 3.5 million motorcycles in the capital city, hardly any of them think about observing road traffic rules," Alviri said, adding that if the police want to curb the road fatality rate, severe limitations should be put on motorcyclists.
