From December 30 to yesterday (January 5), 3,117 people were injured in 2,997 accidents – a fall of 5.5pc in the number of accidents and 6.7pc in the number of people hospitalised.
Mr Wiboon said that although the government set no specific targets for this year’s New Year’s safety campaign, the across-the-board declines were satisfactory.
Drunk driving remained a major cause of accidents, causing 37.3pc of the crashes. Motorcycles were plainly more dangerous than any other vehicle, being involved in 82.3pc of wrecks in which people were sent to the hospital or morgue.
Chatchai Promlert, director-general of the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department, said continuing cooperation from road users and effective law enforcement are necessary in order to reduce accidents.
Chiang Mai proved the most deadly province, with 133 accidents, 18 deaths and 129 injured. Two provinces reported no deaths from road accidents: Singh Buri and Nakhon Phanom.
Bangkok proved relatively safe: 44 of the capital’s 50 districts had no accidents at all. Nationwide, 656 districts, or 74.71pc, also survived accident-free.
The deadliest time of day was 4-8pm, when 30.1pc of accidents occurred. More than 52pc of those killed were of working age.
This year’s numbers showed a downward trend in accident numbers that has continued every year since 2010, according to government figures.
That said, Thailand is still the world’s fourth most dangerous country in terms of road carnage per head of population, according to the World Health Organisation.
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