Five states, Australia and the European Union require safety belts on school buses, while many states already require taller seats. In 1998, Congress ordered NHTSA to research the issue of school bus safety and reconsider its 1977 decision not to require safety belts on buses. About 25 million U.S. children travel on 500,000 buses. School bus travel accounts for just 2 percent of all student fatalities that result from getting to and from school. Between 1995 and 2005, about five school children died annually in bus accidents, for a fatality rate of 0.1 per 100 million miles traveled. By comparison, the fatality rate for school kids killed on bicycles is 12.2 per 100 million miles and for children who walk to school, 8.7 per 100 million miles. In May 2002, NHTSA sent a report to Congress that proposed increasing seat back height from 20 inches to 24 inches and requiring buses under 10,000 pounds to have lap/shoulder belts -- essentially the same recommendations being proposed today. Only lap belts are required on smaller buses. NHTSA came under criticism for failing to act on its 2002 recommendations after a November 2006 bus accident in Huntsville, Ala., killed four high school students when the bus tumbled off an interstate overpass. Since most school buses have no safety belts, the main safety feature is taller seats designed to contain students during a crash. Some individual districts require safety belts, while others require safety belts in only a couple of rows, in case an infant is traveling in a child safety seat. Safety advocates have pushed to require seat belts on buses to better protect riders and because it reinforces for students the need to use restraints in any motor vehicle. In 2002, NHTSA told Congress that adding lap/shoulder belts to all buses could reduce seating by 17 percent because of required seat design changes, and add $40 to $50 per seating position to the cost of a new vehicle. It would cost the industry more than $100 million annually and save only one life a year on average, NHTSA said. The issue of seat belts on commercial buses has also received attention. Former NHTSA Administrator Nicole Nason said in a Detroit News interview in August that she believes commercial bus manufacturers should add seat belts. 'We have a record-high seat belt use in this country and Americans are in the habit of buckling up, and now they are starting to wonder why there aren't seatbelts in places where they might expect them,' Nason said.