23 pedestrians killed on Toronto’s streets so far this year
Posted July 16, 2015 2:30 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
There have been 23 pedestrian deaths in Toronto so far this year, the most recent one occurring on Tuesday night.
A woman, between to be between 50 and 70 years old, died in hospital after she was struck by an SUV on Buckingham Avenue, near Lawrence Avenue East and Mount Pleasant Road.
Before Tuesday’s incident, Toronto police recorded 22 deaths so far this year. In 10 of those fatalities the pedestrian was at fault, while 12 were due to driver error but not due to distracted driving. *** One of the 12 was due to alcohol.
Police said 17 of the 22 deaths — or 77 per cent — involved pedestrians over the age of 55.
In a majority of the cases that involved older people getting hit there was no speed involved.
Police said a combination of factors are at play for the string of pedestrian deaths like driver error or some pedestrians crossing at mid-block.
In some cases, elderly people died after being knocked to the ground.
Earlier this year, a report from a pedestrian safety program at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre finds even though pedestrian deaths are down, the “elderly continue to have the highest pedestrian mortality and morbidity rates of any Canadian population segment.”
“Your body becomes weaker as you get older, and the more traumatic the injury the less likely you will recover,” Toronto police Const. Clint Stibbe said in April.
Stibbe said that in many cases the injuries appear to be minor, but deaths occur due to complications.
“The older we get, the harder it is for our body to heal from these injuries, and in a lot of cases, complications creep in […] individuals are dying as a result of these complications,” he said.
