7 ms·

Evidence That Bike Helmet Laws Don't Help Rider Safety

54 points by kareemm 11y ago

SQL2219 11y ago
I make my kids wear 'em to bed.
DrScump 11y ago
"Since helmet laws don’t necessarily mean compliance, they looked at helmet usage, too, and once again found nothing." Did the author read the study? I can't find anyplace where it has any data about usage. In fact, the words "comply(iance)" or "usage" don't appear in the document once, in any context. Also, it doesn't distinguish between those who always wear helmets and those who claim they use helmets at least half the time.
- nmc 11y ago
  The exact quote from the paper is on page 9: "We therefore also examined the relationship between hospitalisation rates and helmet use proportions in the strata, and again did not find the expected protective effect"
- m0nty 11y ago
  > Data on helmet use in all jurisdictions were available from the 2009/2010 CCHS via the following questions: "In the past 12 months, have you done any bicycling?" and if yes, "When riding a bicycle, how often do you wear a helmet?" > Figure 2 presents the helmet use data in table 3 graphically and illustrates that helmet use was higher with helmet laws than without
leecarraher 11y ago
i returned my helmet as being defective, since when i fell off my bike it didn't protect me from breaking my radius, and forcing me to go to the hospital. Stupid helmet laws, i knew they didn't work...
- yitchelle 11y ago
  imagine if you didn't wear a helmet, would the injury be worst?
  - _ph_ 11y ago
    As I once broke my radius flying over the handle bars, I can at least stat for me: it was my broken hand. My head (I was wearing a helmet back then) never came close to the ground as I landed on my hands. Unfortunately one of them failed to stand the forces and broke. Perhaps without a helmet I had driven a bit less crazy and not crashed stupidly.
    - leecarraher 11y ago
      i tried that excuse with a cop once after being pulled over for not wearing my seatbelt... she was not amused.
  - leecarraher 11y ago
    most likely, but i'd suspect any time your helmet was utilized, the rest of your body likely fared much worse and would need hospitalization anyway. In short , i wonder why they look at overall hospitalization rates and not specifically at chronic head injury. It's like saying tissue purchasing went up in the winter, therefor people must be more depressed because you use tissues for crying, totally missing blowing your nose and cold season.
biehl 11y ago
The money quote "[Bike lanes] has dual advantages, both reducing injuries and encouraging cycling, an important public health goal of its own given the physical activity and environmental benefits. Comparisons between North America and the Netherlands or Denmark have long suggested that their route design focus is better at welcoming cycling and achieving lower injury rates. Many were concerned that Dutch and Danish infrastructure wouldn't have the same impact here, but there is more and more research in North America showing that it does."
- Ended 11y ago
  Absolutely, infrastructure is the real solution. Even if the full Dutch-style bike lane is not possible, quite minor things can make a difference. E.g. around here there are some advance cycle stop zones and advance green lights for cyclists. Both are easy to implement but make a big difference to a cyclist's safety and visibility at a junction.
  - maccard 11y ago
    We have those advance stop lanes for cyclists here, cars just ignore them even when there's cyclists stopped in them ...
    - Ended 11y ago
      That's a shame. They do require cooperation from car users to be effective. There are a lot of cyclists where I live which probably helps things.
    - jacquesm 11y ago
      You have an enforcement problem.
carlob 11y ago
Two important things about helmets: 1. Helmets are very very useful if you're riding fast. In fact they are mandatory in all cycling sports. However most people don't commute to work going much faster than they would if running, hence they are not very useful for them. 2. In countries where helmets are compulsory, the chilling effect of risking a fine for not wearing a helmet has meant a decrease in the number of cyclists. Now, since bike accidents are relatively rare, but the health effects of cycling to work rather than driving benefit every single cyclist, helmet laws tend to have a negative effect on public health. This said, whenever I'm going for a sporty ride (longer, or faster than usual) I usually wear a helmet. When riding 5 minutes to meet a friend for a beer I don't.
- RyanMcGreal 11y ago
  As a corollary to your point #2, there is a clear safety in numbers effect in which as the number of cyclists goes up, the rate - and often the absolute number - of crashes and injuries goes down.
  - carlob 11y ago
    Yes I was going to edit to add that, but you beat me to the punch. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18481926 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18481926
- wtbob 11y ago
  > Helmets are very very useful if you're riding fast. I can't find a reference with a short Googling, but as I recall helmets only help in a fairly narrow window, something like 18-23 mph or so. If one's going sufficiently fast, they're unable to do much good (because the forces are too much for a flimsy assembly of foam and plastic to reduce enough to prevent injury or death). > In fact they are mandatory in all cycling sports. They're the equivalent of a elephant-repelling rock.
  - radu_floricica 11y ago
    > I can't find a reference with a short Googling, but as I recall helmets only help in a fairly narrow window, something like 18-23 mph or so I'd really like a citation on that. I'm into motorcycles and while helmet design is different, every motoGP season has plenty of examples of riders tumbling at +100kph and walking away after.
throwaway5752 11y ago
It's easy: laws or not, wear a helmet if you value your life (or brain). Every cyclist I know has a story of unexpectedly ditching. Even some of them at a dead stop, embarrassingly. I personally have cracked a helmet and walked away. You are higher up, have less stability, and as good as you are you don't control many types of collisions (negligent/distracted drivers). It only takes a very minor fall and some bad luck to end up with brain swelling, cracked skull, or a corpse. Here is a helment advocacy group's take with links to relevant statistics, opposing views: http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm
- wtbob 11y ago
  > Every cyclist I know has a story of unexpectedly ditching. IIRC, the majority of injuries from cycling accidents are to the hands, arms and shoulders. > I personally have cracked a helmet and walked away. Which of course means nothing regarding whether you would have injured your brain. Our hair, scalps and skulls are remarkably good at protecting our brains. > as good as you are you don't control many types of collisions (negligent/distracted drivers) True enough, and of course a strike from a two-ton vehicle travelling 20 mph faster than one will impart far more force on one's body than a strike of a 180-pound body travelling at 18 mph will impart on the road. Helmets are nothing more than magical safety hats; they're placebos; they're a triumph of marketing and emotion over reason and sense. If you wear a bicycle helmet, then logically you should wear a driving helmet, a walking helmet and a sleeping helmet.
  - Kurtz79 11y ago
    "Which of course means nothing regarding whether you would have injured your brain. Our hair, scalps and skulls are remarkably good at protecting our brains." Even so, I would rather have a cracked helmet than a cracked skull.
  - throwaway5752 11y ago
    You are free to make the helmet decisions you see best for yourself and loved ones. For everyone else, I think it's worth contemplating the statistics I linked to from NYC: * Almost three-quarters of fatal crashes (74%) involved a head injury. * Nearly all bicyclists who died (97%) were not wearing a helmet.
5h 11y ago
Statistical significance or not, I have exactly 1 head/brain that has been saved from significant injury thanks to wearing a helmet. Happy to ride my anecdotal evidence all the way to the bank.
- lmm 11y ago
  Why not wear it all the time, or at least when travelling? Per minute, the odds of a helmet saving your life are much higher in a car than on a bike.
  - throwaway5752 11y ago
    Because in a car, you are protected by airbags, crumple zones, seatbelts, and many other safety features that aren't available on a bike.
    - lmm 11y ago
      The statistics by their very nature take all that into account. (And very few cars have ceiling airbags or crumple zones)
      - throwaway5752 11y ago
        I don't think the gp post or mine mentioned any statistics so I can't respond.
    - aylons 11y ago
      And, still, it is more probable to have a deadly head injury in a modern car than on a bicycle. Again, why not?
      - throwaway5752 11y ago
        Because people spend a trivial amount of time cycling vs driving on average, and because impact energy involved are generally 1-2 orders of magnitude higher.
gambiting 11y ago
There's one problem with all reports like this - people who have a crash in a helmet and are fine usually don't report anywhere. I flew over the handlebars and hit the edge of a curb with my head - the helmet split in two but I was fine. If I didn't have a helmet on, I would be dead, I am very certain of that. Yet, my accident - like I am sure thousands of other similar - was not reported anywhere. There is no statistic that measures this. And I think it's absolutely vital for producing reports like this.
feintruled 11y ago
Seems like the UK has it about right then, where wearing a helmet is encouraged but not compulsory. I do wear a helmet, even though it's a pain. Reading around I see a lot of sites claiming they are not effective, but it always seems to be secondary effects - like, cars will pass you more closely, or you will ride more riskily due to a false sense of security. Are there any studies on the actual safety record? Intuitively it seems like of course it will be better for you if you fall wearing a helmet - is this true?
ebbv 11y ago
I can't believe this baloney keeps coming up. Bike helmets DO save lives. There are accidents where they save people's lives. Of course there are accidents where a helmet can't save you. Obviously as well, bike lanes are really important. It's not an either or situation. We can do both.
- _ph_ 11y ago
  No this is not a logical argument. Banning biking alltogether would even save more lives, so by your logic we should ban biking. This an other studies show, that there is no especial reason to wear a helmet during normal reasonable biking. The risks for your head are not significantly worse than when walking or driving a car. You are free to wear a helmet of your choice at any of those activities, but they are not required by law for any of those.
- bloat 11y ago
  This is a complete non-sequitur. One statement: Bike helmet laws do not help rider safety. Another statement: If you, the individual, crash, then wearing a helmet can save your life. These are not contradictory.
jacquesm 11y ago
Here is something that will help you as a cyclist, pedestrian or pretty much anything else except transportation where you're boxed in: learn how to fall. Take some judo classes and learn how to control how you hit the ground, that's everything there is to it short of blunt impact against a lamp post or something like that. If you can roll with a fall rather than simply absorbing the energy with impact or abrasion then you're much more likely to walk away from an accident either entirely unharmed or maybe with some minor injuries. It always surprises me how terribly bad people are at something as basic as falling, which we all do at least several times in our lives and which when handled badly can cause injury or death. Falling with some grace is a very important skill to have. Also: when you're older your bones will take much less abuse before they break than when you're younger so be more careful when you get older. Helmets on bikes: if it makes you feel better: wear one. Don't make them compulsory because the statistics are not clear-cut that wearing a helmet is a good thing in more than 50% of the cases. For kids, probably better, if you're in-experienced or insecure, probably better. If you're an adult, know your bike and you're not going for some kind of record you should have the option to cycle without.
- throwaway5752 11y ago
  Helmet laws aside, please look at page 16 of this report before talking about how effective helmets are: http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/episrv/episrv-bike-report.pdf http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/episrv/episrv-bike... edit: tl;dr for you obviously, but ~200 people died over 8 years in NYC. Where helmet use was noted in the police report (~ half), 97% of fatal accidents involved people not wearing helmets. Someone else can do the Bayes' numbers but it's pretty obvious. Anyway, I support bike lanes and oppose helmet laws. But I wear a helmet.
  - jacquesm 11y ago
    The USA is very much a bike-unfriendly country with some very small regional exceptions, and any effectiveness should be placed in a regional context. In absence of bike-lanes a helmet probably makes sense. What also really helps is to educate drivers and to shift responsibility to the drivers of cars in car-bike collisions. If there was one factor that made bike riding safer here in NL then I'd point at that one rather than bike lanes or helmets. People are simply much more careful around bikes.
the-dude 11y ago
From a Dutch perspective the comments are hilarious.
Luc 11y ago
I feel sad for the people on this thread advocating unconditionally for wearing a bike helmet. They must have to deal with terrible circumstances to have come to that conclusion. Apparently they can't even imagine how one could bicycle safely without a helmet. Keep at it though. It takes a few generations for culture and road architecture to change.
- dlisboa 11y ago
  I don't understand why advocate against it, which people are actually doing in this thread. It's baffling. It's like advocating against the seat belt. It's a safety measure. It doesn't preclude better infrastructure. Yes, there should be better cycling lanes. Many countries do exactly that whenever cycling is envisioned, they build better infrastructure. But you don't wear a seat belt because the roads have potholes, you wear them because they save your life and prevent injuries regardless of road conditions. Is it really terrible that people have to wear a helmet? Of course the focus should be on better protecting bikes (they're vastly different types of vehicles), but I'm not shedding any tears over people who claim they will stop biking because helmets ruin their hair. It's simply a basic preservation of health.
  - Luc 11y ago
    It's simply not needed in my judgement (in my place, time, circumstances, biking speed, traffic, road layout, route, car drivers are used to it, weather, quality of bikes, etc. etc.). Millions of others, bicycling day in day out, think the same way. They're not all dumb.
  - zeveb 11y ago
    > I don't understand why advocate against it, which people are actually doing in this thread. Because cycle helmets cost money which could be better spent on just about anything. Because they reduce the number of cyclists (which is the worst possible thing to do if one wants to make cycling safer). Because they look stupid. Because forcing people to wear them is flat-out illiberal and hence wrong. > It's like advocating against the seat belt. I wear my seat belt, but I advocate against seat belt laws. > Is it really terrible that people have to wear a helmet? Yes. > I'm not shedding any tears over people who claim they will stop biking because helmets ruin their hair. It's simply a basic preservation of health. Do you wear a walking helmet and a driving helmet too? Have you installed non-skid in your bathtub? Statistically, those measures are more effective than a cycling helmet.
DIVx0 11y ago
Over my lifetime riding bikes I have witnessed two major crashes where both non helmeted victims survived with life changing traumatic brain injuries. One fell off a low bridge and the other was riding causally along and somehow ended up going over the bars and hitting her head on the curb. Seeing just one of these was all the reason I needed to never ride without a helmet. I wear a couple types depending on what sort of riding I'm doing (mountain, road, racing) they are MIPS equipped when ever available.
alistairSH 11y ago
What do hospitalization rates have to do with injury rates, with respect to head injuries? Totally anecdotal story, but when I had my last major bike crash (20mph crash during a race), I went to the ER to get checked out. I probably didn't need to go; I knew I had a concussion and lots of abrasions (and know how to treat both). This proves nothing about the efficacy of wearing a helmet.

54 points by kareemm 11y ago

I make my kids wear 'em to bed.

"Since helmet laws don’t necessarily mean compliance, they looked at helmet usage, too, and once again found nothing." Did the author read the study? I can't find anyplace where it has any data about usage. In fact, the words "comply(iance)" or "usage" don't appear in the document once, in any context. Also, it doesn't distinguish between those who always wear helmets and those who claim they use helmets at least half the time.

nmc 11y ago
The exact quote from the paper is on page 9: "We therefore also examined the relationship between hospitalisation rates and helmet use proportions in the strata, and again did not find the expected protective effect"
m0nty 11y ago
> Data on helmet use in all jurisdictions were available from the 2009/2010 CCHS via the following questions: "In the past 12 months, have you done any bicycling?" and if yes, "When riding a bicycle, how often do you wear a helmet?" > Figure 2 presents the helmet use data in table 3 graphically and illustrates that helmet use was higher with helmet laws than without

leecarraher 11y ago

i returned my helmet as being defective, since when i fell off my bike it didn't protect me from breaking my radius, and forcing me to go to the hospital. Stupid helmet laws, i knew they didn't work...

yitchelle 11y ago
imagine if you didn't wear a helmet, would the injury be worst?
- _ph_ 11y ago
  As I once broke my radius flying over the handle bars, I can at least stat for me: it was my broken hand. My head (I was wearing a helmet back then) never came close to the ground as I landed on my hands. Unfortunately one of them failed to stand the forces and broke. Perhaps without a helmet I had driven a bit less crazy and not crashed stupidly.
  - leecarraher 11y ago
    i tried that excuse with a cop once after being pulled over for not wearing my seatbelt... she was not amused.
- leecarraher 11y ago
  most likely, but i'd suspect any time your helmet was utilized, the rest of your body likely fared much worse and would need hospitalization anyway. In short , i wonder why they look at overall hospitalization rates and not specifically at chronic head injury. It's like saying tissue purchasing went up in the winter, therefor people must be more depressed because you use tissues for crying, totally missing blowing your nose and cold season.

biehl 11y ago

The money quote "[Bike lanes] has dual advantages, both reducing injuries and encouraging cycling, an important public health goal of its own given the physical activity and environmental benefits. Comparisons between North America and the Netherlands or Denmark have long suggested that their route design focus is better at welcoming cycling and achieving lower injury rates. Many were concerned that Dutch and Danish infrastructure wouldn't have the same impact here, but there is more and more research in North America showing that it does."

Ended 11y ago
Absolutely, infrastructure is the real solution. Even if the full Dutch-style bike lane is not possible, quite minor things can make a difference. E.g. around here there are some advance cycle stop zones and advance green lights for cyclists. Both are easy to implement but make a big difference to a cyclist's safety and visibility at a junction.
- maccard 11y ago
  We have those advance stop lanes for cyclists here, cars just ignore them even when there's cyclists stopped in them ...
  - Ended 11y ago
    That's a shame. They do require cooperation from car users to be effective. There are a lot of cyclists where I live which probably helps things.
  - jacquesm 11y ago
    You have an enforcement problem.

carlob 11y ago

Two important things about helmets: 1. Helmets are very very useful if you're riding fast. In fact they are mandatory in all cycling sports. However most people don't commute to work going much faster than they would if running, hence they are not very useful for them. 2. In countries where helmets are compulsory, the chilling effect of risking a fine for not wearing a helmet has meant a decrease in the number of cyclists. Now, since bike accidents are relatively rare, but the health effects of cycling to work rather than driving benefit every single cyclist, helmet laws tend to have a negative effect on public health. This said, whenever I'm going for a sporty ride (longer, or faster than usual) I usually wear a helmet. When riding 5 minutes to meet a friend for a beer I don't.

RyanMcGreal 11y ago
As a corollary to your point #2, there is a clear safety in numbers effect in which as the number of cyclists goes up, the rate - and often the absolute number - of crashes and injuries goes down.
- carlob 11y ago
  Yes I was going to edit to add that, but you beat me to the punch. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18481926 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18481926
wtbob 11y ago
> Helmets are very very useful if you're riding fast. I can't find a reference with a short Googling, but as I recall helmets only help in a fairly narrow window, something like 18-23 mph or so. If one's going sufficiently fast, they're unable to do much good (because the forces are too much for a flimsy assembly of foam and plastic to reduce enough to prevent injury or death). > In fact they are mandatory in all cycling sports. They're the equivalent of a elephant-repelling rock.
- radu_floricica 11y ago
  > I can't find a reference with a short Googling, but as I recall helmets only help in a fairly narrow window, something like 18-23 mph or so I'd really like a citation on that. I'm into motorcycles and while helmet design is different, every motoGP season has plenty of examples of riders tumbling at +100kph and walking away after.

throwaway5752 11y ago

It's easy: laws or not, wear a helmet if you value your life (or brain). Every cyclist I know has a story of unexpectedly ditching. Even some of them at a dead stop, embarrassingly. I personally have cracked a helmet and walked away. You are higher up, have less stability, and as good as you are you don't control many types of collisions (negligent/distracted drivers). It only takes a very minor fall and some bad luck to end up with brain swelling, cracked skull, or a corpse. Here is a helment advocacy group's take with links to relevant statistics, opposing views: http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm

wtbob 11y ago
> Every cyclist I know has a story of unexpectedly ditching. IIRC, the majority of injuries from cycling accidents are to the hands, arms and shoulders. > I personally have cracked a helmet and walked away. Which of course means nothing regarding whether you would have injured your brain. Our hair, scalps and skulls are remarkably good at protecting our brains. > as good as you are you don't control many types of collisions (negligent/distracted drivers) True enough, and of course a strike from a two-ton vehicle travelling 20 mph faster than one will impart far more force on one's body than a strike of a 180-pound body travelling at 18 mph will impart on the road. Helmets are nothing more than magical safety hats; they're placebos; they're a triumph of marketing and emotion over reason and sense. If you wear a bicycle helmet, then logically you should wear a driving helmet, a walking helmet and a sleeping helmet.
- Kurtz79 11y ago
  "Which of course means nothing regarding whether you would have injured your brain. Our hair, scalps and skulls are remarkably good at protecting our brains." Even so, I would rather have a cracked helmet than a cracked skull.
- throwaway5752 11y ago
  You are free to make the helmet decisions you see best for yourself and loved ones. For everyone else, I think it's worth contemplating the statistics I linked to from NYC: * Almost three-quarters of fatal crashes (74%) involved a head injury. * Nearly all bicyclists who died (97%) were not wearing a helmet.

5h 11y ago

Statistical significance or not, I have exactly 1 head/brain that has been saved from significant injury thanks to wearing a helmet. Happy to ride my anecdotal evidence all the way to the bank.

lmm 11y ago
Why not wear it all the time, or at least when travelling? Per minute, the odds of a helmet saving your life are much higher in a car than on a bike.
- throwaway5752 11y ago
  Because in a car, you are protected by airbags, crumple zones, seatbelts, and many other safety features that aren't available on a bike.
  - lmm 11y ago
    The statistics by their very nature take all that into account. (And very few cars have ceiling airbags or crumple zones)
    - throwaway5752 11y ago
      I don't think the gp post or mine mentioned any statistics so I can't respond.
  - aylons 11y ago
    And, still, it is more probable to have a deadly head injury in a modern car than on a bicycle. Again, why not?
    - throwaway5752 11y ago
      Because people spend a trivial amount of time cycling vs driving on average, and because impact energy involved are generally 1-2 orders of magnitude higher.

gambiting 11y ago

There's one problem with all reports like this - people who have a crash in a helmet and are fine usually don't report anywhere. I flew over the handlebars and hit the edge of a curb with my head - the helmet split in two but I was fine. If I didn't have a helmet on, I would be dead, I am very certain of that. Yet, my accident - like I am sure thousands of other similar - was not reported anywhere. There is no statistic that measures this. And I think it's absolutely vital for producing reports like this.

feintruled 11y ago

Seems like the UK has it about right then, where wearing a helmet is encouraged but not compulsory. I do wear a helmet, even though it's a pain. Reading around I see a lot of sites claiming they are not effective, but it always seems to be secondary effects - like, cars will pass you more closely, or you will ride more riskily due to a false sense of security. Are there any studies on the actual safety record? Intuitively it seems like of course it will be better for you if you fall wearing a helmet - is this true?

ebbv 11y ago

I can't believe this baloney keeps coming up. Bike helmets DO save lives. There are accidents where they save people's lives. Of course there are accidents where a helmet can't save you. Obviously as well, bike lanes are really important. It's not an either or situation. We can do both.

_ph_ 11y ago
No this is not a logical argument. Banning biking alltogether would even save more lives, so by your logic we should ban biking. This an other studies show, that there is no especial reason to wear a helmet during normal reasonable biking. The risks for your head are not significantly worse than when walking or driving a car. You are free to wear a helmet of your choice at any of those activities, but they are not required by law for any of those.
bloat 11y ago
This is a complete non-sequitur. One statement: Bike helmet laws do not help rider safety. Another statement: If you, the individual, crash, then wearing a helmet can save your life. These are not contradictory.

jacquesm 11y ago

Here is something that will help you as a cyclist, pedestrian or pretty much anything else except transportation where you're boxed in: learn how to fall. Take some judo classes and learn how to control how you hit the ground, that's everything there is to it short of blunt impact against a lamp post or something like that. If you can roll with a fall rather than simply absorbing the energy with impact or abrasion then you're much more likely to walk away from an accident either entirely unharmed or maybe with some minor injuries. It always surprises me how terribly bad people are at something as basic as falling, which we all do at least several times in our lives and which when handled badly can cause injury or death. Falling with some grace is a very important skill to have. Also: when you're older your bones will take much less abuse before they break than when you're younger so be more careful when you get older. Helmets on bikes: if it makes you feel better: wear one. Don't make them compulsory because the statistics are not clear-cut that wearing a helmet is a good thing in more than 50% of the cases. For kids, probably better, if you're in-experienced or insecure, probably better. If you're an adult, know your bike and you're not going for some kind of record you should have the option to cycle without.

throwaway5752 11y ago
Helmet laws aside, please look at page 16 of this report before talking about how effective helmets are: http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/episrv/episrv-bike-report.pdf http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/episrv/episrv-bike... edit: tl;dr for you obviously, but ~200 people died over 8 years in NYC. Where helmet use was noted in the police report (~ half), 97% of fatal accidents involved people not wearing helmets. Someone else can do the Bayes' numbers but it's pretty obvious. Anyway, I support bike lanes and oppose helmet laws. But I wear a helmet.
- jacquesm 11y ago
  The USA is very much a bike-unfriendly country with some very small regional exceptions, and any effectiveness should be placed in a regional context. In absence of bike-lanes a helmet probably makes sense. What also really helps is to educate drivers and to shift responsibility to the drivers of cars in car-bike collisions. If there was one factor that made bike riding safer here in NL then I'd point at that one rather than bike lanes or helmets. People are simply much more careful around bikes.

the-dude 11y ago

From a Dutch perspective the comments are hilarious.

Luc 11y ago

I feel sad for the people on this thread advocating unconditionally for wearing a bike helmet. They must have to deal with terrible circumstances to have come to that conclusion. Apparently they can't even imagine how one could bicycle safely without a helmet. Keep at it though. It takes a few generations for culture and road architecture to change.

dlisboa 11y ago
I don't understand why advocate against it, which people are actually doing in this thread. It's baffling. It's like advocating against the seat belt. It's a safety measure. It doesn't preclude better infrastructure. Yes, there should be better cycling lanes. Many countries do exactly that whenever cycling is envisioned, they build better infrastructure. But you don't wear a seat belt because the roads have potholes, you wear them because they save your life and prevent injuries regardless of road conditions. Is it really terrible that people have to wear a helmet? Of course the focus should be on better protecting bikes (they're vastly different types of vehicles), but I'm not shedding any tears over people who claim they will stop biking because helmets ruin their hair. It's simply a basic preservation of health.
- Luc 11y ago
  It's simply not needed in my judgement (in my place, time, circumstances, biking speed, traffic, road layout, route, car drivers are used to it, weather, quality of bikes, etc. etc.). Millions of others, bicycling day in day out, think the same way. They're not all dumb.
- zeveb 11y ago
  > I don't understand why advocate against it, which people are actually doing in this thread. Because cycle helmets cost money which could be better spent on just about anything. Because they reduce the number of cyclists (which is the worst possible thing to do if one wants to make cycling safer). Because they look stupid. Because forcing people to wear them is flat-out illiberal and hence wrong. > It's like advocating against the seat belt. I wear my seat belt, but I advocate against seat belt laws. > Is it really terrible that people have to wear a helmet? Yes. > I'm not shedding any tears over people who claim they will stop biking because helmets ruin their hair. It's simply a basic preservation of health. Do you wear a walking helmet and a driving helmet too? Have you installed non-skid in your bathtub? Statistically, those measures are more effective than a cycling helmet.

DIVx0 11y ago

Over my lifetime riding bikes I have witnessed two major crashes where both non helmeted victims survived with life changing traumatic brain injuries. One fell off a low bridge and the other was riding causally along and somehow ended up going over the bars and hitting her head on the curb. Seeing just one of these was all the reason I needed to never ride without a helmet. I wear a couple types depending on what sort of riding I'm doing (mountain, road, racing) they are MIPS equipped when ever available.

alistairSH 11y ago

What do hospitalization rates have to do with injury rates, with respect to head injuries? Totally anecdotal story, but when I had my last major bike crash (20mph crash during a race), I went to the ER to get checked out. I probably didn't need to go; I knew I had a concussion and lots of abrasions (and know how to treat both). This proves nothing about the efficacy of wearing a helmet.