By Tina George, reporting from Sweden
Delegates from 140 countries, including 80 Ministers and Deputy Ministers, are currently attending the 3rd Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety.
The Conference is meant to plan a decade of action on Road Safety, which would be implemented by various countries and to find a lasting solutions to road traffic crashes.
1,700 delegates from government, media, civil society organizations and the academia, are also attending the conference.
The Director, Social Determinants of Health, WHO, Dr. Etienne Krug, who disclosed this to newsmen in Sweden, said that road safety issues should not be relegated to the background but given urgent attention.
According to Krug, road traffic crashes, deaths, and injuries have become development issues that needed urgent attention.
He explained that the reason for the conference was to develop the political will that would address the issue of road safety in countries,adding that the conference would set the agenda for the next decade of action in road safety agencies, which aims to see the reduction of road traffic crashes by 50 percent.
The WHO Director said at different plenary discussions, that ministers, senior officers in road transport ministries and agencies across the world, will learn about the lessons from the last decade of action; how to have good leadership; and how to finance road and other priorities for the next 10 years.