Some 782 people lost their lives in traffic accidents across Türkiye between January and the end of April this year, according to the official figures.
According to the data shared by the traffic department within the General Directorate of Security (EGM), 62,765 individuals were injured in 159,132 traffic accidents throughout the country.
During the last month in particular, the death toll when compared to the previous three months increased as 258 people were killed and some 26,281 were injured in 44,901 accidents that took place in 81 Turkish provinces.
The accidents claimed the lives of 185 individuals in January, 152 in February and 187 in March, as per the official data.
Compliance with traffic safety rules is still low in the country despite repeated traffic safety campaigns prioritized by the government with reckless driving, almost invariably being the top cause of accidents every year.
The number of accidents increased during last month's Ramadan Bayram, also known as Eid-al-Fitr, when hundreds of thousands of vehicles hit the roads.
Though the country boosted law enforcement and modernized its roads, the number of casualties in Türkiye is still relatively high. The casualties reported in the first four months of 2023 do not include the people who later succumbed to injuries they sustained in the accidents. Thus, the number of fatalities might be higher.
According to the reports of Ihlas News Agency (IHA) compiled from the EGM, the number of drivers that caused accidents after running a red light was 1,821, while other accidents occurred because of violation of rules related to changing lanes, failure to adjust the speed or entering the no-vehicle designated areas.
Approximately 595,000 drivers were penalized for various traffic rule violations from January through April, the data highlighted.
According to the annual data shared by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat), the number of traffic accidents increased by 4.6% year-over-year in 2021 due to the easing of the COVID-19 effect and stood at 1,186,353.
The number of people who lost their lives in accidents in 2021 was 5,362, while 274,615 others sustained injuries.