WELLINGTON COUNTY – At the Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph (WDG) Public Health board meeting on June 3, covered a few finalized reports, including the most recent Injury Surveillance Report.
The document presents data on transport-related injuries in the area from 2005 to 2024.
According to the dataset, injury-related emergency department (ED) visits in WDG declined by approximately 15 per cent.
A downward trend in transport-related visits, injuries for pedestrian, cyclist, on and off-road cases, have decreased ED visitations by about 40 per cent from 2005 to 2024.
However, manager of data and analytics, Michael Whyte, said pandemic periods actually saw an increase in transport-related injuries.
Whyte said not every town and city has an equal number of injuries, which will determine their action plan going forward.
Compared to WDG’s average transport-related injury rate from 2021 to 2024 there are a few local municipalities which have seen higher ED visitations.
In the Wellington region of WDG, Minto, Mapleton and Wellington North have the most notable figures.
For all age ranges Minto’s injury rate was 48 per cent over WDG’s average, Wellington North was 28 per cent and Mapleton was 20 per cent.
For specific age demographics Mapleton’s 75 plus population saw an injury rate of 258 per cent over-average.
Minto’s 45-64 age group was 92 per cent over-average and 0-19 year-olds in Wellington North are 98 per cent over the WDG average injury rate.
This data is being used with local partners, such as the County’s Safe Communities initiative, to plan prevention practices and take action on these trends.
Whyte said these partnerships \make evidence-based reports possible to ensure safety and prevention practices can be effectively applied to local communities.
