BEIJING -- Accidents of different types are the biggest cause of death for Chinese children aged under 14, with 100,000 children dying from accidents every year, says a report released by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday.

Traffic accidents and drowning are the main causes of death and slips and animal attacks are the main causes of child injuries, according to the report.

The center obtained the results by analyzing children accident documents published in the past half a century and checking data from the center's disease monitoring stations nationwide.

It is estimated that 10.1 million Chinese children are injured every year, but only 8 million see doctors. Accidents are the cause of death of about 101,000 children and the cause of handicaps for 404,000, figures from the report show.

However, the report said, China's children death rate had dropped markedly in the past 50 years, from 1.82 percent in 1957 to 0.2 percent in 2000.

Meanwhile, the infant death rate dropped from 20 percent in the 1950s to 3.2 percent in 2000. But there was no obvious drop in the rate between 1991 and 2000.

According to the report, China has not yet implemented a nationwide system to prevent child accidents.

The statistics from the National Working Committee on Children and Women under the State Council show 42.5 million elementary and middle school students are injured every year, inflicting total economic losses of 3.26 billion yuan (US$418 million).

The committee quoted a survey as saying that 26.1 percent of children died of accidental injury. "The number is still rising at the rate of 7 percent per year," it warned.

"Accidental injury to children has brought about both huge economic loss for the families and irreversible physical and psychological hurt to themselves," stated the committee.

The committee blamed rapid urbanization and industrialization and the changes in road, transportation and urban facilities for the increasing deaths as they increased daily risks for children.

The report follows the drowning of five children in a river in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality on May 19.

China's Ministry of Education has called for local educational departments to step up safety measures and conduct safety training of students and parents to prevent such tragedies from reoccurring.