Part 3. The UN Road Safety Week.

Keywords. UN Road Safety Week, road accidents, young people, cause of deaths, first step, preventable.

Vocabulary. bid, helmet, obstacle.

A. You are going to hear a report on the UN road safety program.

Listen carefully, write down the major points about the program.

United Nations is holding the world's first Road Safety Week this week in bid to raise safety awareness among road users and to reduce the number of road accidents.

The week is aimed especially at young people.

Latest figures from the World Health Organization showed that road accidents are now the biggest cause of death among the people aged between 10 and 24.

Every year almost four hundred thousand young people die in road accidents.

Although the type of road accident varies.

In Africa, which has the highest proportion of deaths those killed are frequently children playing in the street because they have nowhere else to go.

In Asia, where two-wheeled transport is common, young people are more often involved in motorcycle accidents.

While in Europe and the United States, most victims are young and inexperienced car drivers.

Doctor Attian Krug at the World Health Organization says a first step to saving these lives would be to recognize that road deaths are preventable.

Road traffic crashes can, to certain extent, to be predicted.

We know that if a road is badly designed, if a car is badly maintained or if drivers or road users in general don't follow the rules, there is going to be crashes.

We know also that we can act on these different elements of the road safety system to prevent those crashes.

UN Road Safety Week aims to encourage young people to take basic measures such as wearing seat belts and car helmets.

but it also wants governments to focus more on road safety, too, by designing safer roads and building traffic-free play areas for children.

"It's a good investment", the UN says, "because road traffic accidents currently cost over 500 billion dollars a year."

They are not just a waste of young lifes but an obstacle to development.

B. Listen again, focus on some specific details.

Complete the exercise.