In my early days with Safe Saskatchewan, a safety professional taught me the Three "E's" of safety: Education, Engineering and Enforcement. When all three "E's" are working in concert the principle is that people become more aware, the hazard is often reduced and testing the limits is against the law thereby reducing or eliminating injuries. A good example of the application of this principle is the seat belt legislation that has been in existence in our province for several years now. Education is ongoing, vehicles are more safely engineered than they ever have been and seat belt enforcement campaigns are ongoing. The result is that the number of injuries and in particular, deaths on the Saskatchewan road system has decreased substantially over the years. The Three "E's" have been instrumental in shifting behavior and preventing injuries.

With regards to the second "E's", engineering, take a look at his video clip. It's a test collision between a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air (AKA "Tank") and a 2009 Chevrolet Malibu. You'll probably be surprised by the results. Man, have we come a long way with respect to how vehicles and other products are engineered, with safety in mind. When I watch the video, I'm just about brought to tears at the site of a vintage vehicle like the '59 crumple up - - - on the other hand I would be traumatized if the vehicle used in this clip was a '57 Chev Bel Air Ragtop - - - that would truly be sacrilege.

While the Three "E's" are tools in our injury prevention toolkit and using seatbelt legislation as an example, why is it that we still have close to 7,000 injuries and about 140 deaths on Saskatchewan roadways every year? What are your views on what else is required to reduce these statistics even further?