Helmet maximum safety protection risk assesment/compensation 2021

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mjr
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Re: Helmet maximum safety protection risk assesment/compensation 2021

Post by mjr »

Paulatic wrote:However if you are happy to wear one and feel that it is necessary then I don’t have a problem with that. It is your choice.

I think they should be banned from the open highways as careless cycling because users have restricted hearing and eyesight and make daft decisions, possibly due to risk compensation or brain overheating, putting all nearby riders in danger, to say nothing of the indirect effects on motorist attitudes ;)
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pjclinch
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Re: Helmet maximum safety protection risk assesment/compensation 2021

Post by pjclinch »

mjr wrote:
Paulatic wrote:However if you are happy to wear one and feel that it is necessary then I don’t have a problem with that. It is your choice.

I think they should be banned from the open highways as careless cycling because users have restricted hearing and eyesight and make daft decisions, possibly due to risk compensation or brain overheating, putting all nearby riders in danger, to say nothing of the indirect effects on motorist attitudes ;)


They are actually a No for Bikeability Scotland trainees, with the potential peripheral vision issues cited.
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pjclinch
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Re: Helmet maximum safety protection risk assesment/compensation 2021

Post by pjclinch »

Steady rider wrote:I am concerned about helmets and discussions because it may well be the focus turns to highlighting dangers and risks, that the public takes to mean cycling is dangerous


CUK have long (and I think reasonably) highlighted the effect of "dangerisation" of cycling in the usual victim-blaming approaches to road safety (wear PPE and dayglo or you're a statistic waiting to happen, kind of thing).

And I think it's entirely likely that Steve300 has been caught up in the idea that cycling is far more dangerous than it is. Back before the 90s nobody worried very much about hitting their heads aside from sport cyclists who'd sometimes wear hairnet-type helmets really as a way of improving one's chances of getting back on rather than seeing stars and nursing a lump.
But these days there's lots of people in countries where helmets are pushed who feel that not only is the occasional fall reasonably likely (in itself, fair enough) but if you do go down you're practically certain to hit your head, and in turn if you do that there's a high chance of death or brain damage resulting. And from pre-helmet days we know that it simply doesn't work like that, but we've persuaded ourselves it's all different now and these things are a solution.

I was at high school in the 70s/80s. Lots of pupils rode in from all over the borough, no helmets (didn't exist), no "facilities" (didn't exist), and they might have done Cycling Proficiency. So hundreds of journeys every week undertaken by 11-18 year olds on their own on busy roads in an outer London borough, and nobody really worried about their heads (and I don't recall any of them being broken). Conditions aren't directly comparable, but I don't think anything has changed in a way that a lightweight helmet would make much difference.

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drossall
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Re: Helmet maximum safety protection risk assesment/compensation 2021

Post by drossall »

As well as the comments of Ben Goldacre, the medical statistician, in the BMJ article cited above, there's those of Chris Boardman about helmets not even being in the top ten things you'd do to promote cycling safety. Set aside the question of how much helmets work for now, and understand what else Chris is saying there, because I've direct experience of a situation where young people were having accidents (off-road) and switching to full-face helmets was proposed as the response.

The problem with that is set out by Chris's statement. There are more than ten other things that you should do first, before looking at whether helmets would help. But the focus on helmets was, in my assessment and that of others whom I consulted, distracting attention from those other measures. So I took other steps, rejected the full-face helmets on some of the grounds above, and had no serious accidents except one bashed knee (to an adult) in the sessions for which I was responsible. Now I can't be sure whether that was enough sessions to be statistically significant, but it did leave me feeling that Chris was saying much more than simply a contribution to the debate over whether helmets work.

From that perspective, I would suggest, the focus on helmets can be actively dangerous. And remember, to the best of my knowledge, they have been definitively proven to prevent 0% of accidents, unlike some of the measures that I did take.
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Ride-sleep-repeat
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Re: Helmet maximum safety protection risk assesment/compensation 2021

Post by Ride-sleep-repeat »

Steve300 wrote:you'll still want something that will protect your face and teeth aswell if you fall onto concrete. So its covenience over protection? ok im just wondering because I wear a downhill helmet for commuting i guess im used to having it on at all times.

'At all times' meaning you wear it when going up and down the stairs at home etc?
I get wearing one for DH(I used to) but for commuting?I wouldn't even wear the BMX "pi$$-pot" type either.Too hot,too sweaty.Those road riders that choose to wear a helmet wear one with plenty of vent-holes for a reason!
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