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I did a casual bike tour through hundreds of miles of Netherlands and Belgium. We wore helmets, obviously. Not wearing a helmet is inconsisent with having many

I did a casual bike tour through hundreds of miles of Netherlands and Belgium. We wore helmets, obviously. Not wearing a helmet is inconsisent with having many standards for reflectors and traffic planning. Although someone maybe slightly more careful, falling on a bicycle means a risk for head injuries. Why not take reasonable precautions, including instructing people that helmets do not add safety to anything besides head injuries? They're not a panacea, but protect against certain classes of injuries. Anecdotally: When I was a kid, an obscured oily patch of road contributed to a fall to one side, head first, and slide for about 10 feet and the helmet I was wearing cracked instead of my skull. Road rash but didn't die or end up with traumatic brain injury.

revelation 9y ago
Well you can just as much slip on that oil patch and crack your head open as a pedestrian.. Of course those scenarios are very far removed from what actually causes injuries and death. The Netherlands has a much much lower incidence of head injuries not because they wear styrofoam hats but they realized it's better to stop the trucks and cars from driving into people than in vain trying to soften the impact. Creating secure bike routes just has a tremendously higher return on investment compared to convincing people to wear helmets that bringing them up just labels you a shill in many peoples eyes, a concern troll distraction.