A workshop was held in the central Da Nang city on Dec. 17 to discuss measures to raise people’s awareness on the importance of having children wear helmets when riding motorcycles.

The event is part of the project “Promoting action on child helmet use” funded by the Asia Injury Prevention (AIP) Foundation.

Participants discussed such issues as measures to raise people’s awareness on traffic safety law, education programmes on child helmet use regulations at schools and the role and responsibilities of teachers and parents in encouraging children to wear helmets.

In Da Nang , the AIP Foundation has collaborated with the city’s traffic safety committee and the Education-Training Department to deliver 1,500 leaflets at Hoa Van and Ngo Quyen primary schools.

The foundation has provided nearly 20,000 discount vouchers of child helmets for the city’s Education and Training Department.

Every year, traffic accidents kill 11,000 people and injure over 10,000 others in Vietnam . A large number of victims are children.

Realising the importance of wearing helmets for children, in May, 2011, Vietnam responded the UN campaign “A decade for Road Traffic Safety (2011-2020)” and a campaign to call upon people to have their children wear helmets while traveling on bikes.

The country has chosen 2012 as a traffic safety year and targeted to reduce the yearly traffic accident fatalities by 5-10 percent./.