BEIJING, Sept 14 (AFP) - Nearly 68,000 people died on China's roads in the first eight months of the year and more than 300,000 were injured, state press said Tuesday.
The loss of property in the accidents was valued at about 1.68 billion yuan (200 million dollars), Xinhua news agency reported, citing police statistics.
Although the number of accidents -- 340,000 -- were down by 24 percent from the same period last year, the number of fatalities was 2.7 percent or 1,805 deaths higher, the report said.
The Asian Development Bank warned in July that if no action was taken to change the trend Chinese road accidents could kill more than 200,000 people a year by 2010, while the number of injured could double to one million annually.
Last year, 104,000 people died in traffic accidents in China, or 285 every day, according to government statistics.
China accounts for about 15 percent of traffic deaths worldwide although it has just more than two percent of the world's vehicles.