Official Statistics

Reported road casualties Great Britain: Injury severity within injury-based reporting systems 2023

Updated 26 September 2024

This factsheet presents an initial high-level summary of statistics on injury severity and injury type, for reported road collisions in injury-based reporting systems police forces in Great Britain. The department welcomes feedback on this factsheet and, subject to this, will complete further analysis.

This factsheet is based on data for 2023 updating previous versions with data for 2019 and 2020 and for 2021 and 2022. This reflects changes in the number of police forces using injury-based reporting systems.

1. Introduction

Since 2012, some police forces have begun providing STATS19 road casualty data through injury-based reporting systems, most commonly CRaSH (Collision Recording and SHaring system). Within injury-based reporting systems, casualty severity data is determined by the most severe injury sustained.

This has provided 2 new variables that have not previously been published, most severe injury sustained and a more specific casualty severity variable. The figure below shows how the traditional severity-based assessment of casualties as killed, serious and slight map to each injury-based reporting system casualty severity level and the associated injuries (a copy in table format is available in related guidance). This classification was informed by research commissioned by the department.

Figure 1: Injury-based classification of severity

This analysis is based on data for 27 police forces using the CRaSH system in 2023. Although the Metropolitan police also used an injury-based system over this period, the data was not considered to be sufficiently consistent for inclusion. More details are contained within the caveats section. The full list of forces using injury-based systems in 2023 can be found in our guidance on injury based reporting and severity adjustments.

The data therefore does not represent all casualties in Great Britain, and may not be representative of all police forces. This should be kept in mind when interpreting the results.

2. Casualty severity - overall

There were 74,157 casualties reported within injury-based reporting system police forces in 2023. Table 1 shows the breakdown of these by casualty severity, including the breakdown of serious casualties into very serious, moderately serious and less serious. The proportions of casualties of each severity were broadly similar to those in previous years, with the majority being slight casualties.

Table 1: Number and proportion of casualties of each severity: injury-based reporting system forces 2023

Casualty severity	Casualties in 2023	% of all 2023 casualties
Killed	1,006	1.4
Very Serious	3,029	4.1
Moderately Serious	3,732	5.0
Less Serious	9,825	13.2
Slight	56,565	76.3
Total	74,157	100.0

3. Casualty severity by road user type

Chart 1 shows the number of serious casualties (including less, moderately and very serious) for each road user type in 2023. The chart also shows the percentage of each serious casualty type, as a proportion of the total number of serious casualties, broken down by road user type in 2023.

Within the serious category, ‘less serious’ injuries were the most common for each road user type, and ‘very serious’ injuries were least common.

Vulnerable road users (for example pedestrians, pedal cyclists) generally had a higher proportion of less serious injuries than non-vulnerable road users. In 2023, around 70% of serious pedestrian and pedal cyclist casualties were categorised as ‘less serious’, compared around half of serious car occupant casualties.

Chart 1: Number and severity breakdown of serious casualties, by road user type: 2023

4. Most severe injury sustained - overall

Table 2 shows the number and percentage of casualties with each injury in 2023. Note that this is only the most severe injury recorded by the police, not a full list of all injuries sustained. The proportion of injuries categorised under each injury has remained broadly stable over the last 5 years (figures for 2019 to 2022 are published separately).

Table 2: Number and percentage of casualties, by most severe injury recorded: 2023

Most Severe Injury Type	Casualties in 2023	% of all 2023 casualties
Deceased	1,006	1.4
Broken neck or back	828	1.1
Internal injuries	813	1.1
Multiple severe injuries, unconscious	176	0.2
Severe chest injury	456	0.6
Severe head injury, unconscious	753	1.0
Deep penetrating wound	115	0.2
Fractured pelvis or upper leg	1,169	1.6
Loss of arm or leg (or part)	51	0.1
Multiple severe injuries, conscious	378	0.5
Other chest injury, not bruising	2,009	2.7
Deep cuts, lacerations	1,262	1.7
Fractured arm, collarbone, hand	2,955	4.0
Fractured lower leg, ankle, foot	2,517	3.4
Other head injury	3,076	4.1
Bruising	9,957	13.4
Shallow cuts, lacerations, abrasions	12,517	16.9
Shock	2,497	3.4
Sprains and strains	13,469	18.2
Whiplash or neck pain	18,101	24.4
Other injury	20	0.0
Total	74,125	100.0

5. Most severe injury sustained by road user type

Table 3 shows the percentage of casualties assigned each most severe injury sustained, broken down by road user type, in 2023.

Compared to other road user types, van and car occupants had higher proportions of injuries categorised as whiplash or neck pain. Motorcyclists had a higher proportion of injuries categorised under all 3 types of fractures compared to other road user types. Pedal cyclists, pedestrians and motor cyclists had a higher proportion of severe head injuries and, alongside Heavy Goods Vehicle (HGV) occupants, a higher proportion of shallow cuts, lacerations and abrasions. These road user type differences are illustrated in Chart 2.

Table 3: Percentage of casualties assigned each most severe injury, by road user type: 2023

Most Severe Injury Type	Casualty Severity	Pedestrian	Pedal Cyclist	Motorcyclist	Car Occupant	Van Occupant	Bus Occupant	HGV Occupant	Other Veh Occupant
Deceased	Killed	2.3	0.8	2.8	1.0	1.0	0.1	2.2	2.1
Broken neck or back	Very Serious	0.9	1.1	2.1	1.0	1.1	0.4	1.0	0.9
Internal injuries	Very Serious	1.1	0.9	2.0	1.0	0.9	0.5	0.7	1.3
Multiple severe injuries, unconscious	Very Serious	0.3	0.2	0.6	0.2	0.3	0.1	0.0	0.3
Severe chest injury	Very Serious	0.4	0.6	1.1	0.6	0.6	0.3	0.5	0.6
Severe head injury, unconscious	Very Serious	2.2	1.7	1.7	0.5	0.6	0.6	1.2	3.3
Deep penetrating wound	Moderately Serious	0.2	0.3	0.5	0.1	0.1	0.1	0.0	0.3
Fractured pelvis or upper leg	Moderately Serious	3.0	1.7	5.6	0.7	0.9	0.7	0.7	1.9
Loss of arm or leg (or part)	Moderately Serious	0.1	0.0	0.4	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.2	0.1
Multiple severe injuries, conscious	Moderately Serious	0.7	0.7	1.1	0.4	0.4	0.0	0.7	1.7
Other chest injury, not bruising	Moderately Serious	0.9	1.8	3.1	3.3	2.5	1.8	3.5	1.5
Deep cuts, lacerations	Less Serious	2.6	3.5	2.3	1.1	1.2	1.7	3.5	3.2
Fractured arm, collarbone, hand	Less Serious	4.2	8.6	10.8	2.4	2.2	2.4	4.2	4.3
Fractured lower leg, ankle, foot	Less Serious	9.5	3.2	10.8	1.0	1.4	0.1	2.7	5.2
Other head injury	Less Serious	6.0	4.9	1.9	3.9	2.9	7.6	3.5	5.8
Bruising	Slight	21.1	14.8	10.7	11.8	11.4	21.9	10.7	14.0
Shallow cuts, lacerations, abrasions	Slight	21.5	33.0	17.2	13.2	16.0	18.4	23.1	26.0
Shock	Slight	2.3	0.8	0.7	4.4	3.1	4.9	4.7	3.1
Sprains and strains	Slight	17.2	15.9	18.8	18.6	19.7	21.1	13.4	14.4
Whiplash or neck pain	Slight	3.6	5.3	5.7	34.9	33.8	17.5	23.1	10.2
Other injury	Any	0.1	0.1	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Total	All	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0

Chart 2: Road user type differences in the percentage of casualties assigned certain most severe injuries: 2023

6. Caveats

The Metropolitan police used an injury-based system to report road casualties over this period. However, casualty data from the Metropolitan police is currently inconsistently populated within the STATS19 database. Metropolitan police data has therefore been removed from this analysis. The exception to this is the small number of casualties that occurred in Metropolitan police areas, but were reported by neighbouring police forces using CRaSH. This casualty data was retained for table 1 and chart 1. Additionally, a small number of casualties across several police forces were removed from this analysis, due to inconsistent casualty severity and most severe injury type data. Solutions to these data issues are being investigated by the department.

7. Feedback

We welcome further feedback on any aspects of the department’s road safety statistics including content, timing, and format, via the contact details below. Data on the more detailed breakdown of injuries is not currently included in the annual road casualty statistics, but further breakdowns can be requested via the details below. Applications for researchers wishing to use the detailed record level data will also be considered, though must meet the department’s conditions for holding and processing sensitive data.

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10. Contact details

Road safety statistics

Email roadacc.stats@dft.gov.uk