Tragedies hit communities hard

Amid the constant dismay of hearing of people dying from COVID-19, came the horrific news yesterday of a fatal car crash on the Western Highway.

Many of us sunk in our chairs and took an anxious breath as we absorbed gut-wrenching news that two people had died and another was seriously injured near Dadswells Bridge.

The tragedy was an awful reminder that while the numbers of people who have died from COVID-19 continued to rise, we have long experienced other deadly ‘pandemics’ that have seemingly always gnawed away at everyday life.

Road trauma and tragedy has been a common companion for western Victorian communities and fundamental in a persistent lobby for safer roads and better public-transport options in our part of the world.

The last thing we needed to hear yesterday, while trying to navigate through the stresses of the COVID pandemic, was news of another tragedy on our roads.

It hit some of us like a ton of bricks and as always, immediately had us thinking about family and friends.

It has been a case of us going in with all guns blazing to limit a death toll from COVID-19.

And for years there has been a consistent groundswell to fight the impact of various fatal illnesses.

Considerable effort also goes into powerful messaging about the ever-present danger we face on our roads.

And it’s events such as yesterday’s dreadful crash that illustrate our vulnerability.

In the end, we remain unsure, beyond demanding better roads, safer public-transport options, incentives to get more freight on rail, more resources for road-rule enforcement and continuing programs and projects promoting driver safety, what else to do.

If there is a profound one-off answer to eliminating the road-toll scourge, it remains elusive.

Saving lives is the primary incentive behind our massive response to fighting disease. It must also always be the motivating factor in tackling the incidence of road trauma. We have lost 161 people on Victorian roads this year.

In most cases we can only really encourage everyone to always consider safety for themselves and, critically, others – be it during a pandemic, on the road or, in short, everything we tackle.

We feel for and extend best wishes to all people hurting.