Malta had the lowest rate of road fatalities relative to the population in the EU in 2015 spite of a 10 per cent increase in the number of traffic victims over the previous year, Eurostat said today.

It said this morning that the lowest rates of road fatalities in 2015 were observed in Malta (2.6 road traffic victims reported in the country per 100,000 inhabitants), Sweden (2.7) and the United Kingdom (2.8), ahead of Denmark and the Netherlands (both 3.1), Ireland and Spain (both 3.6).

At the opposite end of the scale, the highest rates were recorded in Bulgaria (9.8 road traffic victims in the country per 100,000 inhabitants), Latvia and Romania (both 9.5), followed by Lithuania (8.3), Croatia (8.2), Poland (7.7) and Greece (7.4).

Compared with 2014, the number of road traffic victims in 2015 rose in a majority of EU states, with the highest increase being observed in Cyprus (+26.7%), followed by Finland (+16. %), Croatia (+13%), Austria (+11.4%), the Netherlands (+11.3%), Slovenia (+11.1%) and Malta (+10%).

In contrast, the most remarkable falls were observed in Estonia (-14.1%), Ireland (-14%), Latvia (-11.3%), Lithuania (-9.4%), Poland (-8.2%) as well as Portugal (-7.1%).

At EU level, the number of road traffic victims remained almost stable, having slightly increased from nearly 26,000 in 2014 to around 26,100 in 2015.
Over a longer time period however, the trend is consistent with all member states recording notable decreases compared with 1995.

In particular, the number of road traffic victims was cut by more than two-thirds in Estonia (from 332 in 1995 to 67 in 2015, or -79.8%), Portugal (-78.1%), Latvia (-71.5%), Slovenia (-71.1%), Spain (-70.6%), Denmark (-69.4%) and Greece (-66.6%).

In contrast, the number of road fatalities were reduced by less than 40% in Malta (from 14 in 1995 to 11 in 2015, or -21.4%), Romania (-33.5%) and Finland (-39.7%). Overall in the EU, the number of road traffic victims has more than halved (-59.2%) between 1995 and 2015.