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KUALA LUMPUR - Statistics from the Road Safety Department reveal that the main cause of fatal motorcycle accidents was head injuries caused by riders refusing to wear safety helmets.
Seventy per cent of the accidents occurred in housing areas and villages.
The department's Kuala Lumpur director, Muhammad Heeza Hassan, said fatal accidents usually happened just five to 10 minutes away from the homes of victims.
"Some motorcyclists prefer not to put on helmets and at times would use non-safety compliant helmets when travelling short distances.
"What's alarming is that 40 per cent of fatal motorcycle accidents involved victims aged between 16 and 35," he said at the Management and Technology University Road Safety Advocacy Campaign yesterday.
Heeza said other causes of fatalities in motorcycle accidents included road conditions and vehicle defects.
There were 29,097 road accidents in Kuala Lumpur between January and June this year and 119 of them involved fatalities, involving 126 victims. Last year, 112 deaths were recorded during the same period, Heeza said.
Motorcyclists recorded the highest number of fatalities on the roads in Kuala Lumpur last year, with 227 deaths.
As part of the government's effort to reduce road accidents in the country, the department and the Education Ministry are integrating road safety topics into the syllabus.
"Since January, Form One students have started learning the road safety syllabus introduced by the Transport Ministry during their language lessons.
"At the same time, the Road Transport Department is making amendments to the driving school training modules to provide more knowledge on safety to new drivers," he said.
 
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