J
Just Zis Guy
Guest
On Mon, 3 May 2004 13:47:47 -0700, "Jay Beattie"
<[email protected]> wrote in message
<[email protected]>:
>> >Bicycle helmet law can save lives
>> Yet strangely never does.
>How about "yet proof of this fact is [elusive]
>[inconclusive] [statistically difficult to prove]." Choose
>a discriptor. There is no way anyone can say categorically
>that a helmet did not save somebody's life somewhere.
>"Saving life" meaning that the victim lived, regardless of
>the degree of morbidity.
Not the point. Bicycle helmet *laws* have never saved lives.
>Everytime we have this thread (and it seems to be about
>every five months or so), we trot out the same arguments
>pro and con -- with decreasing support on either side. What
>always amazes me is the reaction from the folks in U.K. and
>Australia who claim a huge decrease in ridership when
>helmet laws pass. What is up with that?
Street counts of cyclists before and after passage of a
law, showing reductions of over 1/3 following passage of
the law, and the fact that ten years later, despite a
growing population, cyclist numbers in Aus. are still below
pre-law levels.
>When I was 15 or 16, I rode for one reason -- to get
>somewhere. My mother was not going to drop everything and
>give me a ride to school just so I would not have to muss-
>up my hair with a stinky ol' bicycle helmet.
And now cycling is officially so dangerous it can't be done
without a plastic hat, how many mothers are goign to forbid
their children to ride for transport? Or simply not buy them
bikes? Or never get them started with road cycling, keeping
them confined ot parks and bikeways, so the kids grow up
with no concept of cycling for transport?
>I really cannot figure out why helmet helmet laws are such
>a "live free or die" issue for so many.
It's not a "live free or die" issue at all. It's
exasperation with the monomaniac focus on plastic hats over
and above all other cycling safety issues. British
government figures show that a universally obeyed helmet law
might result in the saving of exactly one life per year, but
as a consequence of promoting helmets as the panacea for all
cycling deaths, there is a bery real risk that injuries and
deaths will actually be caused through risk compensation.
People are told that a helmet makes them invulnerable, how
is that going to affect their riding? And, given that
helmets are not designed for crashes involving motor
vehicles, what will be the overall effect? Will it be, as in
Australia and Alberta, an increase in the death and serious
injury rate?
And what about child pedestrians, who suffer comparable
proportions of head injuries, comparable severity ratio, but
with many times more cases? Wouldn't it be better, rather
than forcing helmets on children in one activity which is
statistically no more dangerous than walking (and by some
measures actually much safer), to concentrate on reducing
danger at source? Not just for the small proportion of
children on bikes? Because that's the reality, it's a law
which may at best prevent a small proportion of injuries to
a small proportion of children, while completely ignoring
the cause of danger. Motor vehicles accoutn for one in ten
injury hospitalisations in the UK, but half of all deaths.
It's not cycling that's dabngerous, it's cars. And they kill
far more pedestrians than cyclists.
So I am against helmet compulsion because it is a dangerous
distraction from the real business of safety.
Guy
--
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
88% of helmet statistics are made up, 65% of them at Washington University
<[email protected]> wrote in message
<[email protected]>:
>> >Bicycle helmet law can save lives
>> Yet strangely never does.
>How about "yet proof of this fact is [elusive]
>[inconclusive] [statistically difficult to prove]." Choose
>a discriptor. There is no way anyone can say categorically
>that a helmet did not save somebody's life somewhere.
>"Saving life" meaning that the victim lived, regardless of
>the degree of morbidity.
Not the point. Bicycle helmet *laws* have never saved lives.
>Everytime we have this thread (and it seems to be about
>every five months or so), we trot out the same arguments
>pro and con -- with decreasing support on either side. What
>always amazes me is the reaction from the folks in U.K. and
>Australia who claim a huge decrease in ridership when
>helmet laws pass. What is up with that?
Street counts of cyclists before and after passage of a
law, showing reductions of over 1/3 following passage of
the law, and the fact that ten years later, despite a
growing population, cyclist numbers in Aus. are still below
pre-law levels.
>When I was 15 or 16, I rode for one reason -- to get
>somewhere. My mother was not going to drop everything and
>give me a ride to school just so I would not have to muss-
>up my hair with a stinky ol' bicycle helmet.
And now cycling is officially so dangerous it can't be done
without a plastic hat, how many mothers are goign to forbid
their children to ride for transport? Or simply not buy them
bikes? Or never get them started with road cycling, keeping
them confined ot parks and bikeways, so the kids grow up
with no concept of cycling for transport?
>I really cannot figure out why helmet helmet laws are such
>a "live free or die" issue for so many.
It's not a "live free or die" issue at all. It's
exasperation with the monomaniac focus on plastic hats over
and above all other cycling safety issues. British
government figures show that a universally obeyed helmet law
might result in the saving of exactly one life per year, but
as a consequence of promoting helmets as the panacea for all
cycling deaths, there is a bery real risk that injuries and
deaths will actually be caused through risk compensation.
People are told that a helmet makes them invulnerable, how
is that going to affect their riding? And, given that
helmets are not designed for crashes involving motor
vehicles, what will be the overall effect? Will it be, as in
Australia and Alberta, an increase in the death and serious
injury rate?
And what about child pedestrians, who suffer comparable
proportions of head injuries, comparable severity ratio, but
with many times more cases? Wouldn't it be better, rather
than forcing helmets on children in one activity which is
statistically no more dangerous than walking (and by some
measures actually much safer), to concentrate on reducing
danger at source? Not just for the small proportion of
children on bikes? Because that's the reality, it's a law
which may at best prevent a small proportion of injuries to
a small proportion of children, while completely ignoring
the cause of danger. Motor vehicles accoutn for one in ten
injury hospitalisations in the UK, but half of all deaths.
It's not cycling that's dabngerous, it's cars. And they kill
far more pedestrians than cyclists.
So I am against helmet compulsion because it is a dangerous
distraction from the real business of safety.
Guy
--
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
88% of helmet statistics are made up, 65% of them at Washington University