This is a variant of your above unsubstantiated claim.
Since no one should be hitting a cyclist this is a non-sequitur
Actually in the NFL you can be penalized for that & it’s not taught as the proper way to tackle at pretty much every level but since cyclists shouldn’t be tackling anyone this is another comment that has no bearing
Oooh, we finally have a correct statement. I agree one should learn how to properly fit & wear a helmet; they are not a beret & shouldn’t be angled like one. However, even an improperly worn helmet may provide some protection in the event of a crash but is unlikely to cause additional injury; therefore, one may still be better off with one on.
See your own previous sentence. A properly fitted helmet will have the straps close to the head/face; there really shouldn’t be enough room to get an object of any substantial size between the straps & the head/face to cause strangulation. Nor is anyone here arguing against removing said helmet when getting off of the bicycle.
Maybe that’s because this is a site dedicated to fighting ignorance???
I suppose if you’re afraid of getting laughed at, that might be something you’d want to take into account.
But we’ve seen a striking example quite recently of how willing many people are to laugh at safety precautions as “foolish” that aren’t in fact foolish at all. Namely, the low-level ridicule that many East Asians used to encounter in Western societies for their practice of wearing facemasks in situations where they were concerned about airborne transmission of infection. Whaddya know, that practice turned out to be not mere “silly germphobia” after all.
I’ve lived in the Netherlands and biked helmetless there on their very nice bike-friendly streets and paths, just like all the people around me. But when I’m back in the States biking in the decidedly more bike-unfriendly American traffic, I wear my helmet. Because there is literally no downside to my doing so, and because the helmet will provide substantial protection in case of head impact.
I’m not insecure enough to be bothered by the prospect of my Dutch former neighbors, or anybody else, laughing at me for my headgear choices.
Why should we believe that wearing helmets actually causes cyclists to take more risks? All the claims for that position that I’ve seen are basically hypothetical “it stands to reason” arguments unsupported by actual evidence.
Comparing boxer headgear use to cyclist helmet use is so intrinsically ridiculous as to deserve no further comment.
See above.
Incorrect use of any safety equipment definitely reduces its benefits, but that’s not an argument against using safety equipment correctly.
Again, risks from incorrect use of safety equipment don’t automatically imply that correct use of safety equipment is bad.
Like I said, I have a lot of sympathy with cycling advocates wanting to focus on more effective measures for promoting cycling safety (e.g., dedicated bike lanes/paths, better traffic control, etc.), and with their promotion of cycling as a safe and fun activity. But the attempts that some of them make to argue against helmet use (which is different from arguing against helmet laws) are just plain silly, and your posts have been showcasing a lot of that silliness.
Not sure why you cannot. I tried on multiple ISPs and it seems available for free on all of them. Maybe it is country restricted an you are not in the US? Here is another link to the PDF version:
Nope. I am in the USA. Tried your link in three different browsers. Only option is to buy the PDF for $41.95.
Have you actually read the meta-analysis or just the abstract?
I know it’s not a popular way to go around here but I don’t form my opinions from scary headlines – I want to read the actual research, like the hundreds of pages of actual research papers I linked to earlier … which most of the posters here have clearly not bothered to look at because it’s hard and their minds were already made up anyway … like the last couple of posters who have denied / dismissed the idea of risk compensation.
What’s wrong with the abstract? Other than it proves you wrong. -
Abstract
A meta-analysis has been conducted of the effects of bicycle helmets on serious head injury and other injuries among crash involved cyclists. 179 effect estimates from 55 studies from 1989–2017 are included in the meta-analysis. The use of bicycle helmets was found to reduce head injury by 48%, serious head injury by 60%, traumatic brain injury by 53%, face injury by 23%, and the total number of killed or seriously injured cyclists by 34%. Bicycle helmets were not found to have any statistically significant effect on cervical spine injury. There is no indication that the results from bicycle helmet studies are affected by a lack of control for confounding variables, time trend bias or publication bias. The results do not indicate that bicycle helmet effects are different between adult cyclists and children. Bicycle helmet effects may be somewhat larger when bicycle helmet wearing is mandatory than otherwise; however, helmet wearing rates were not found to be related to bicycle helmet effectiveness. It is also likely that bicycle helmets have larger effects among drunk cyclists than among sober cyclists, and larger effects in single bicycle crashes than in collisions with motor vehicles. In summary, the results suggest that wearing a helmet while cycling is highly recommendable, especially in situations with an increased risk of single bicycle crashes, such as on slippery or icy roads.
If you refuse to cough up the money to access the study, why should anyone else?
I was away from the boards for a few months due to computer issues. I had forgotten the pleasure of having a couple of posters kill your thread over some pedantry!
@running_coach It doesn’t prove me wrong. To me, it proves that scary clickbait headlines are effective at separating fools from their money.
“If you refuse to cough up the money to access the study, why should anyone else? “
Because I strongly suspect that much of the stuff in that PDF contradicts the research to which I have freely linked, and because I strongly suspect that much, if not most, of the 55 studies referenced in the meta-analysis will be available for free from other sources. If all 55 studies are only ‘for sale’, well … you’re own with that.
Back to the OP:
Another problem with helmet mandates – an unknowable number of kids simply will not wear a helmet for their own personal reasons; they look goofy, it messes up their hair, freedum, etc.
Some of them will walk to school, increasing their chance of death from traumatic brain injury from 0.6% for a cyclist to 3.4% for a pedestrian. Some of their parents will choose to drive them to school, increasing their chance of death from traumatic brain injury to 15%.
An easier to read format. The data links to the CDC and it it free.
US traumatic brain injury deaths per year
Modnote: Addressing whether Bike Helmets are actually effective is a valid part of this thread. Meta Posts about each other’s cites is derailing the thread. Lets drop this part.
A good example of what I asked to be dropped. So again. Drop this side discussion. You have links to articles or studies about the effectiveness of bike helmets, that is great. But no more commenting about this off subject stuff.
Sorry, misunderstood. I was intending to point out that the referenced study is from a peer-reviewed journal, that is why it isn’t free - i.e., defending the quality of the cite. Discussing quality of cites (and pointing out lack of quality in cites) seems like a valid part of this type of discussion.
I can’t say I follow the recent studies closely. But all emergency doctors see lots of head injuries, and the studies I recall (certainly dated) claimed a reduction in serious head trauma by 60-85% with typical use. They protect the face and neck to a lesser degree. One assumes most children are not riding on freeways nor are professional athletes, and have a variable understanding or interest in risks and safety.
So I do not have a problem with schools encouraging helmets or guidelines recommending them. I think they reduce both morbidity and mortality. I do not know whether use would be increased by a guideline approach or sporadically enforced laws. I think there is some value to schools encouraging use, but parents should do this too. (I think our school had a “bike safety” day with obstacle courses, road signs, signals and prizes which seems a good approach; a few hours and done). In some cases cost is certainly a concern and not every child will keep them on. Still, an adult may be better able to appreciate the risks of not wearing a helmet - but you can guess how I feel about that.
This attempted argument is likewise rife with eyeroll-inducing levels of statistical misunderstanding.
What the data in that linked article actually report are percentages of total traumatic brain injury fatalities per year suffered by people in each category (i.e., cyclists, pedestrians, motorists).
But how the article title misleadingly describes the results is “Relative risk of head injury” for people in each category. And your post naively buys into that misinterpretation.
However, it’s fundamentally wrong. The fact that cyclists account for only 0.6% of all TBI deaths while pedestrians account for 3.4% of them and motorists 15% does not mean that cyclists have only a 0.6% “chance of death from traumatic brain injury”, while the other activities have correspondingly higher risks.
Percentage of total deaths is dependent not just on how intrinsically risky the activity is, but also on numbers of total participants, total time spent in the risky environment, etc. You can’t just look at the death percentage numbers and naively infer that they represent relative intrinsic risk.
Since there are a lot more pedestrians and motorists than cyclists, for example, and even most cyclists spend a lot more time driving and/or on foot than on a bicycle, we would expect to see higher numbers of accidents and consequent TBI deaths among motorists and pedestrians than among cyclists, even if cycling is intrinsically a much more risky activity.
There are lots of other flaws in the reasoning, too. For example, the 15% motorist TBI fatalities figure doesn’t distinguish between accidents at highway speeds and low-speed residential-street driving. Ordinary common sense tells us that no, it’s not at all likely that a child being driven to school in a seatbelt inside a closed car on local streets is really at higher risk of a fatal accident than a child riding to school on an unprotected bicycle on those same streets.
As I said, I sympathize strongly with fellow cycling advocates wanting to promote cycling as a healthy activity and encourage appropriate safety measures without exaggerating the risk levels. But if they can’t achieve those aims without outright misrepresenting the facts by such obviously fallacious arguments as the above, they’d do better to keep quiet.
@Kimstu “… does not mean that cyclists have only a 0.6% “chance of death from traumatic brain injury …”
Correct. It doesn’t mean that AND it doesn’t say that.
Since we’ve already been modded several times for this sort of post I am going to refrain from further comments like this. The facts are there for those who wish to see them AND for those who wish to misinterpret them.
At emergency medicine conferences we were polled how many people in the US got critical head injuries from playground equipment each year. I think the answer averaged around sixty in the US. In Canada (where we use the 1/10 rule of applying American statistics), this has been enough to enormously reduce the height and scope of what is offered due to liability and insurance concerns. The audience was split on whether this was a good or bad thing.
I suspect head injuries on non-motorized transport are much more common and frequent. There is a role for education. Surely they should also learn common street signs and turning signals too. I do not think there is a big role for enforcement, but could be persuaded.
Your linked article clearly implies that, with its title “Relative risk of head injury”, and its claim that “other people [than cyclists] are much more likely to be head injury victims”.
Both those characterizations are incorrectly implying that cited data on percentages of annual TBI fatalities associated with various activities such as motoring, walking and cycling represent the risk associated with those activities.
So does your earlier remark that “Some of them will walk to school, increasing their chance of death from traumatic brain injury from 0.6% for a cyclist to 3.4% for a pedestrian”. Right there you made the very claim, about cyclist risk of TBI death, that your subsequent post claims is not being made.
To further highlight the absurdity of that claim, note that the percentages are collected from records of average TBI fatalities per year: about 53K total, about 8000 for motorists (15% of total), about 1800 for pedestrians (3.4%), and 325 for cyclists (0.6%). Meanwhile, the annual TBI death toll for rock climbers is less than 38. IOW, rock climbing accounts for less than 0.07% of all TBI fatalities, much lower than the any of the percentages from cycling, walking and motoring.
Does that imply that rock climbing actually involves less relative risk of TBI fatality than cycling, walking or motoring? Of course not.
I think what was being modded was just vague sniping about the credibility of sources in general terms, not discussions of specific flaws in specific arguments.
ISTM that explaining what’s wrong with the specific claim that cited data about TBI fatalities in cycling and other activities imply certain conclusions about the relative risk of TBI fatalities in those activities is entirely relevant to the discussion about the safety of cycling and the safety benefits of bike helmets. If the mods think otherwise, of course, they’re free to call me to order about it.
The science around (bicycle) helmet safety is questionable at best.
A person riding a bike is not like a construction worker, where any lid will provide protection against lacerations from falling objects.
Where is the science comparing different bicycle helmet designs? Are people suggesting you just have to wear ANY kind of bicycle helmet to be considerable safer?
Where is the data comparing people who crashed in comparable circumstances? (A flat road, at X speed, with/without obstacles?) For
what speeds is my helmet rated?
Where are the Euro NCAP tests for bicycle helmets? What standards is my bicycle helmet compliant with? Who is developing those standards?
As it is now helmets are fashion accessories.
—as a kind of “Pascal’s wager” I wear a helmet when on my road bike, I wouldn’t consider wearing one when doing shopping on my box bike, nor do I(we) require my daughter to wear one riding to school. I(we) did until she was ~7.
We live in Holland, the safest (by a large margin) country in the world for cyclists. We (the Dutch) don’t wear helmets on bikes unless it is for sports.
To address the OP, I don’t know why you would expect a school to enforce safety rules on how students get to the school. It’s simply not their responsibility in my opinion.
