Study cyclists usually crash alone

18/02/2014

After pedestrians, cyclists are the most vulnerable group in traffic. Your risk of injury is particularly high compared to motorists in an accident. A new study comes to the conclusion that cyclists usually crash without the participation of others.

60 to 90 percent without accident opponents
Although cyclists are the most vulnerable group on the road after pedestrians, this does not mean that they are only injured because of collisions with other road users. Because now, as a study by the „British Medical Journal“ far more than half of all cyclists are killed alone. Depending on the country and the study collective, between 60 and 90 percent of the cyclists treated in hospitals have no accident opponents.

Data from Göttingen and Münster
The published international meta-study thus confirms the result to which the accident research of insurers (UDV) had already come in 2010. In total, the study surveyed over 200,000 cyclists from 18 countries treated in hospitals and medical outpatient clinics. Data from two cities flowed from Germany. So it was in the bicycle-friendly city of Münster 72 and in the university city of Göttingen 60 percent so-called single accidents.

Many accidents are not recorded by the police
In other countries, the figures are also very high and so the share of non-owned accidents in France and Belgium is 72 and 87 percent, respectively. And in cities or regions where there is a lot of cycling, such as in Denmark or the Netherlands, it is 74 percent. However, many accidents are not recorded by the police, which complicates the evaluation and classification for accident research. For the cyclists killed, however, the rate of single accidents at five to 30 percent is much lower. Since fatal traffic accidents are usually recorded by the police, the number of unreported cases is also significantly lower here. (Sb)

Picture: Siegfried Fries