Center of excellence for Road Safety: the first pilot project on the national territory, which makes use of transversal skills in the field of road safety, thanks to the collaboration between the State Police, La Sapienza University of Rome, ASL Roma 1 and the ANIA Foundation.
The Center of Excellence on Road Safety was presented today at the Palazzo del Commendatore in Rome, which makes the protocol signed by the Chief of Police, General Director of Public Security Prefect Franco Gabrielli, operational by the Rector of the University of Rome La Sapienza, operational. Eugenio Gaudio, from the Director of ASL Roma 1 Angelo Tanese and from the President of the ANIA Foundation Maria Bianca Farina.
Working on the theme of prevention to reduce accidents and on awareness of road risk: this is the objective on which the protagonists with different skills converge, united in a joint task force that will systematize experiences and data to derive a model predictive behavior and risk profiles, which can reduce the number of road accidents.
After an incessant decrease in victims from 2001 to 2014, in the last five years the trend of the accident phenomenon has become "fluctuating" without, unfortunately, ever managing to fall below the threshold of 3.000 victims a year. Even the partial data, as shown by the statistics of the activity of the State Police and the Carabinieri, relating to the first 11 months of 2019, shows a trend similar to that of the previous year, with 1.492 deaths (3% less than 2018 which had recorded 1.538 victims).
The complexity of the accident phenomenon today requires new and more incisive forms of partnership that can determine an effective cooperation between public and private partners, in view of synergies that put together technical, engineering, statistical and psychological analysis, with the final goal of building preventive models of road accident phenomenon.
From this point of view, the Research and Training Center aims to raise the level of safety on the roads which is developed with a targeted and studied communication activity, to understand the accident phenomenon in relation to the causes of drivers' physical unfitness and processing and production of scientific data on the human factor underlying road accidents, following the guidelines that the European Commission has drawn in view of reducing mortality and road traffic injuries.
Data on road accidents, the result of accurate monitoring, will be incorporated into an anonymous database that will allow a valid aid for planning targeted enforcement actions.
Each of the Centre's partners has specific skills and experience on issues related to road safety, and for years has developed innovative national and international projects on the subject.
Some of these already see consolidated synergies between the State Police, the Sapienza University of Rome and the Ania Foundation, which together have curated the "ICARO" projects, the road education campaign that since its inception has reached over 600.000 students of the schools of every order and degree of the whole Italian territory, "Chirone" and "Ania Cares", dedicated to psychological assistance to victims of road accidents and their families, while the operational protocol signed with the Local Health Authority Rome 1 was implemented with the Attorney General of Rome and the Lazio Region, in application of the law on road homicide.
As part of the Centre's activities, prevention initiatives will also be planned for citizens or specific targets, such as schools, senior centers and workplaces, which will be accompanied by extensive training activities aimed at health personnel and police forces. calls to intervene by giving first aid to the direct and indirect victims of accidents.
A strong synergy, therefore, for the multi-factorial model dedicated to the prevention of road accidents and the promotion of health linked to road behavior.