Dubai: A private health-care group will launch a traffic awareness campaign next month in collaboration with the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) to help reduce deaths and injuries on the roads.
"The number of cars in the roads is increasing," said Dr Azad Moopen, chairman of DM Healthcare, announcing the campaign. He said a special van will be dedicated to spreading awareness of road safety among schoolchildren.
Last year, 134 people died on Dubai roads alone and about half of them were pedestrians, police said. Dubai Police are trying to curtail the number of traffic accident deaths and have also initiated various campaigns against texting and speaking on the mobile phone while driving. According to police records the number of fatalities across the country was more than 800 in 2010.
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The dedicated van will also go to labour accommodations and offer free blood sugar and other tests. It will offer free testing to 25,000 people in these places over the next ten months, he said.
As part of its silver jubilee celebrations, DM Healthcare is offering to fund surgery of 50 children in a Gulf country who suffer from congenital heart diseases. The children will be flown to India for the operations, he said.
Jamal Majid Khalaf Bin Thaniah, director of DM Healthcare, said the group's Care Beyond Borders initiative is its way of giving back to the community.
