1st Feb 2020 @ 6:00 am

Road traffic deaths in Spain fell by 7.6% to 1,098 in 2019, despite an increase in the amount of cars and journeys across the nation. 4,398 people overall required hospital attention after an accident.

Spain’s Interior Minister, Fernando Grande- Marlaska presented the figures last month, saying that although he welcomed the positive trend, the total was still “unacceptable.”

Of accidents, 39% involve cars leaving the road, while frontal (23%) and side (12%) collisions, hitting pedestrians (11%) and rear-end collisions (9%) make up the rest. These proportions have not changed in recent years.

In the Canaries, road deaths also fell from 44 in 2018 to 39 last year. Once again, more people drowned in the seas off the Canary Islands than died in traffic accidents.