Michael Bloomberg: Automakers, Developing Nations Must Commit to Auto Safety

American automobile manufacturers have made enormous progress in recent decades to ensure that the cars we drive here in the U.S. are safer. American consumers now take airbags and anti-collision systems for granted when they buy a car, and the long-term trend is clear: Lives are being saved on our roads. And it’s a great time to celebrate those accomplishments this week at the 25th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles in Detroit. 

Unfortunately, vehicle safety is a very different story abroad. Many developing countries have lax vehicle safety standards. Around the world, road crashes kill an estimated 1.3 million people each year and injure up to 50 million. There, automakers — including U.S. and European companies — routinely sell cars without many of the basic safety protections that are standard here at home. Often, they are sold without airbags or electronic stability systems, and they are not capable of protecting passengers in crashes above 35 m.p.h. The result: An awful lot of people are being killed in crashes that, in the U.S. and Europe, they would likely survive.

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