SUVs are the most dangerous cars on the road for all drivers, according to recent findings by the University of Michigan and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

And in a book titled "High and Mighty - SUVs: The world's most dangerous vehicles and how they got that way", the Detroit bureau chief of The New York Times, Keith Bradsher, argues that trucks pose threats both to the environment and road safety.

SUVs, with their raised bumpers, endanger both pedestrians and motorists in smaller, standard cars.

Yet SUV drivers are at least as likely as car occupants to die in a crash and much more likely to be paralysed, Mr Bradsher says.