Slippery sidewalks costing Toronto $6.7M a year: Report
Toronto Public Health is urging the city to get better at clearing snow from sidewalks, as 30,000 people have landed in the emergency room over the last decade.

metronews.ca
By May Warren
Oct. 25, 2016

Winter is coming.

With it comes snowy and icy sidewalks that not only send thousands to the emergency room but also costs the city $6.7 million a year in liability claims, according to a new report from Toronto Public Health.

Almost 30,000 people went to the emergency room and 2,800 landed in the hospital because they took a tumble on snowy winter sidewalks from 2006-2015, the report says.

Monica Campbell, director of healthy public policy at Toronto Public Health, said she was “a bit surprised” at the numbers, and wants to remove barriers to walking.

“We want to make sure that people have opportunities to be physically active, and one of the easiest ways to do so and the cheapest as well is to be able to walk,” she said.

Toronto Public Health is suggesting the city do more to protect residents from falls by lowering the threshold for sidewalk snow clearing from eight centimetres to two centimetres.

Slippery sidewalks are an especially troubling issue for seniors.

Falls involving the elderly can be “catastrophic” even if they do recover without any permanent injuries because it can make them afraid to venture outside, said Anthony Quinn, director of public affairs at CARP, which advocates for older adults.

“That fear of falling causes them to be less active, which causes them to become weaker and actually increases their chances of falling again, and sustaining an injury,” he said.

Nancy Smith Lea, director of the Toronto Centre for Active Transportation, suggested spending more on snow clearing could potentially save the city money in the long run by reducing the number of liability claims.

“That seems to me like it would be a really wise use of resources,” she said.

By the numbers:

• The median age of the 30,000 people who visited emergency rooms between 2006 and 2015 because of falls on snow or ice was 51.
• Eight per cent of those hospital trips were considered life threatening.
• Slips and falls due to ice cost the Ontario healthcare system roughly $4 million annually.