A 28-year-old woman from the Kochani village of Trkanje was seriously injured and a three-year-old child sustained bodily injuries in a traffic accident on the road between Obleshevo and Kuchichino.

According to police, the accident was reported at 09:55. The woman was riding a moped when at one point she lost control and fell onto the roadway. The three-year-old child was travelling with her as a passenger. Both were examined and treated at the Clinical Hospital in Shtip.

A moped with a three-year-old on it. No moped in this country has a seat for a child that age, no holder, no structure of any kind that would keep them in place during a fall. A helmet for a three-year-old, if there even was one, does not solve much when the vehicle goes over on asphalt.

Police will investigate the case. But this form of transport is not a one-morning coincidence - it is a daily sight on roads across the country's interior. A moped or a motorcycle carrying two, sometimes three people, often with a child in front or wedged between adults. We see it, register it as normal, and drive on.

The most common reason is not carelessness but arithmetic: a moped is cheaper than a car, and in smaller places it is often the only vehicle in the household. That explains the choice, but it does not change the physics of asphalt.

A three-year-old on a moped in traffic has no protection at all. For everything else - speed, licences, the condition of the road - there are fines and checks. For this there is usually nothing, except too late.