The impact of child safety restraint legislation on child injuries in police-reported motor vehicle collisions in British Columbia: An interrupted time series analysis

Abstract

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVE: Motor vehicle collisions (MVCs) remain a leading cause of death and serious injury in Canadian children. In July 2008, British Columbia introduced child safety seat legislation that aimed to reduce the number of children killed or injured in MVCs. This legislation upgraded previous child seat legislation (introduced in 1985) and affected children zero to three and those four to eight years of age. The objective of the present study was to evaluate the effectiveness of this legislation. METHODS: Deidentified police reports for all MVCs involving zeroto 14-year-olds (2000 to 2012) were used to compare injury rates, booster seat use, and seating position among children before and after booster seat laws. An interrupted time series design was used to estimate the effect of the new law on injuries among children zero to three and four to eight years of age. Estimates were adjusted using children nine to 14 years of age as controls. RESULTS: The booster seat law was associated with a 10.8% (95% CI 2.7% to 18.9%) reduction in the monthly rate of injuries in four- to eight-year-old children (P=0.01). This was equivalent to a decrease of 14.3 injuries per 1,000,000 children. Similarly, the monthly injury rate among children zero to three years of age decreased by 13.0% (95% CI 1.5% to 24.6% [9.8 injuries per 1,000,000]; P=0.03). CONCLUSION: The results provide evidence that British Columbia's new child safety restraint law was associated with fewer injuries among children covered by the new laws.