Transport accidents

< causes of Injury

Transport is part of our daily lives and a major component of the economy. Unfortunately, every year, thousands of Australians are hurt or die in road and other transport accidents, most commonly while in a car, or on a motorcycle or bicycle.

Transport injuries resulted in around:

This represents 12% of injury hospitalisations and 9.9% of injury deaths. Males and young people are particularly at risk, and fracture is the most common type of injury sustained in hospitalised cases.

This report summarises data on unintentional transport injuries resulting in hospitalisation or death. Intentional injuries are included under Self-harm injuries and suicide or Assault and homicide.

Types of transport involved in injury hospitalisations

In 2020–21, 31% of transport injury hospitalisations were for car occupants and 25% were for motorcyclists (Table 1).

Notes

1. Rates are crude per 100,000 population.
2. Percentages may not total 100 due to rounding.
3. Codes in brackets refer to the ICD-10-AM (11th edition) external cause codes (ACCD 2019).

Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.

For more detail, see Data tables B1–2.

Types of transport involved in injury deaths

In 2019–20, 51% of transport injury deaths were for car occupants and 16% were for motorcyclists (Table 2).

Notes

1. Rates are crude per 100,000 population.
2. Percentages may not total 100 due to rounding.
3. Codes in brackets refer to the ICD-10 external cause codes (WHO 2011).

Source: AIHW National Mortality Database.

For more detail, see Data tables E1–2.

Seasonal differences

Hospital admissions due to transport injuries suggest some patterns over the year. There are several peaks, potentially due to changed traffic during holiday periods.

In March 2020, COVID-19 restrictions interrupted the usual activity of many Australians. In April 2020, the number of hospital admissions due to transport injuries was noticeably lower than previous years, and there were 11% fewer from March to May than the same period of the previous year (Figure 1). As initial restrictions eased, transport injuries rose and by June were higher than the same month of previous years.

The interactive display shows other seasonal patterns in injury hospitalisations.

Figure 1: Seasonal differences in transport injury hospitalisations, 2018–19 to 2020–21

Notes
1. Admission counts have been standardised into two 15-day periods per month.
2. A scale up factor has been applied to June admissions to account for cases not yet separated.

Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.

Trends over time

The age-standardised rate of hospitalisations due to transport injuries in 2020–21 was 8.2% higher than a year earlier. The previous year had seen a small drop likely related to COVID-19 restrictions, which impacted travel and the need for transportation services.

From 2011–12 to 2016–17 there was an average annual rise of 1.0% for the age-standardised rate of hospitalisations.

There is a break in the time series for hospitalisations between 2016–17 and 2017–18 due to a change in data collection methods (see the technical notes for details).

For transport deaths, the age-standardised rate for 2019–20 was 8.0% lower than a year earlier. The average annual change in rate between 2010–11 and 2019–20 was -3.7% (Figure 2).

Figure 2: Transport injury hospitalisations and deaths, by sex and year

For more detail, see Data tables C1–3 and F1–4.

Age and sex differences

Rates of hospitalisation and death caused by transport injuries differ between males and females, especially for certain age groups (Figure 3).

For transport injury hospitalisations in 2020–21:

• 2 in 3 hospitalisations were for males (68%)
• the age-standardised rates were:
  • 369 cases per 100,000 males, and
  • 172 cases per 100,000 females
• young people aged 15–24 had the highest rate.

For transport injury deaths in 2019–20:

• 3 in 4 deaths were for males (77%)
• the age-standardised rates were:
  •  7.9 deaths per 100,000 males, and
  •  2.2 deaths per 100,000 females
• people aged 65 and over had the highest rate.

Figure 3: Transport injury hospitalisations and deaths, by age group and sex

For more detail, see Data tables A1–3 and D1–3.

Severity

There are many ways that the severity, or seriousness, of an injury can be measured. Some of the ways to measure the severity of hospitalised injuries are:

• number of days in hospital
• time in an intensive care unit (ICU)
• time on a ventilator
• in-hospital deaths.

The average number of days in hospital for transport injuries was similar to the average for all hospitalised injuries in 2020–21, while the percentages of cases that included time in an ICU and cases that involved continuous ventilatory support were both higher. The rate of in-hospital deaths was lower (Table 3).

Note: Average number of days in hospital (length of stay) includes admissions that are transfers from 1 hospital to another or transfers from 1 admitted care type to another within the same hospital, except where care involves rehabilitation procedures.

Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.

For more detail, see Data tables A13–15.

Types of injuries sustained

In 2020–21, the head and neck was the body part most often identified as the main site of injury in transport hospitalisations (Figure 4), although this varies by the type of transport. In part, it may reflect the inherently more serious nature of head and neck injuries.  

Figure 4: Transport injury hospitalisations by main body part injured, 2020–21

Hover over a body part for more information:

Notes

1. Main body part refers to the principal reason for hospitalisation.
2. ‘Trunk’ includes thorax, abdomen, lower back, lumbar spine & pelvis.
3. Number and percentage of injuries classified as Other, multiple, and incompletely specified body regions and Injuries not described in terms of body region not shown—see Data table A11.

Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.

For more detail, see Data table A11.

Fractures were by far the most common type of injury for people who were hospitalised due to a transport accident (Figure 5).

Figure 5: Transport injury hospitalisations by type of injury, 2020–21

For more detail, see Data table A10.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people

Among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people:

• there were 3,700 hospitalisations due to transport accidents in 2020–21, with males twice as likely as females to be hospitalised (Table 4)
• there were 86 deaths in 2019–20 due to transport accidents, with males 2.5 times as likely to die (Table 5)
• hospitalisation rates were highest among people aged 15–24 (Figure 5).

Note: Rates are crude per 100,000 population.
Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.

Notes

1. Rates are crude per 100,000 population.
2. Deaths data only includes data for New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, and the Northern Territory.

Source: AIHW National Mortality Database.

For more detail, see Data tables A4–5 and D4–5.

Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians

Indigenous Australians, when compared with non-Indigenous Australians, were:

• 1.6 times as likely to be hospitalised due to a transport accident in 2020–21 (Table 6)
• 2.5 times as likely to die in a transport accident in 2019–20 (Table 7).

Notes

1. Rates are age-standardised per 100,000 population.
2. ‘Non-Indigenous Australians’ excludes cases where Indigenous status is missing or not stated.

Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.

Notes

1. Rates are age-standardised per 100,000 population.
2. ‘Non-Indigenous Australians’ excludes cases where Indigenous status is missing or not stated.
3. Deaths data only includes data for people whose usual residence was New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, and the Northern Territory.

Source: AIHW National Mortality Database.

The rate of transport injury hospitalisations was highest among the 15–24 age group for both Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians (Figure 6). Deaths data are not presented because of small numbers.

Figure 6: Transport injury hospitalisations, by Indigenous status, by age group and sex, 2020–21

For more detail, see Data tables A4–6 and D4–8.

Remoteness

People living in Remote areas, compared with people living in Major cities, were:

• 2.3 times as likely to be hospitalised by a transport accident in 2020–21 (Table 8)
• 6.0 times as likely to die in a transport accident in 2019–20 (Table 9).

Note: Rates are age-standardised per 100,000 population.
Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.

n.p. Not published because of small numbers, confidentiality or other concerns about the quality of the data.
Note: Rates are age-standardised per 100,000 population.
Source: AIHW National Mortality Database.

The highest rate of transport injury hospitalisation cases was among the 15–24 age group living in Remote areas of Australia. (Figure 7).

Deaths data are not presented in Figure 7 because of small numbers.

Figure 7: Transport injury hospitalisations, by remoteness, by age group and sex, 2020–21

For more detail, see Data tables A7–9 and D9–10.

For information on how statistics are calculated by remoteness, see the technical notes.

Data details

Technical notes: how the data were calculated

Data tables: download the full tables

Glossary

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