A neurosurgeon has been branded “irresponsible” for his comments about bike helmets being useless for protecting the safety of cyclists.
Speaking at the Hay festival, Henry Marsh, a neurosurgeon at St George’s Hospital in Tooting, said:
“I see lots of people in bike accidents and these flimsy little helmets don’t help.”
He went on to reference a recent study from the University of Bath, which found that by wearing a helmet meant drivers gave cyclists less room, and put them at greater danger.
Cyclist safety campaigners have called his comments “irresponsible”, and reference a recent Department of Transport study, which showed that helmets could prevent 10-16% of cyclist fatalities
2 Comments
http://depts.washington.edu/hiprc/practices/topic/bicycles/index.html
Attewell, 2001. Results provide clear evidence of helmet benefits. Helmets reduce risk of head, brain, facial injury, and death.
Kelsch, 1996. Bicycle helmets reduced the incidence and severity of head injuries.
Finvers, 1996. Strong prospective effect of helmets for serious head injuries. Protective effect of helmet underestimated due to exclusion of ICU cases. None of the ICU cases wore helmets.
Acton, 1996. Oral maxillofacial injuries frequent. Design modification helmets need such as a lightweight chin protector.
Thompson et al., 1996. Bicycle helmets are effective for all bicyclists regardless of age and regardless of motor vehicle involvement in the crash.
Thompson et al., 1996. Helmets protect against upper face and middle face injuries. Use of two control groups thought to “bracket” the true effect of helmets on risk of facial injury.
Maimaris et al., 1994. Helmet use significantly reduces the risk of sustaining a head injury, regardless of type of bicycle accident. Some evidence refuting claims that helmet users are either more cautious or take more risks than non-users.
Thomas et al., 1994. Helmet use significantly reduces the risk of upper head injury and loss of consciousness in a bicycle crash.
McDermott et al., 1993. Helmet use significantly protects against head injury.
Spaite et al., 1991. Helmeted riders over 33 times less likely to sustain a major head injury and over 16 times less likely to have an ISS (injury severity score) >15 than non-helmeted riders.
Thompson et al., 1990. Significant protective effect among helmet users for serious upper facial injuries compared to non-users.
Thompson et al., 1989. Helmet use protects against risk of head and brain injury by 85% and 88% respectively compared to those not wearing helmets. Population-based control group provides the best estimate of helmet effect.
from https://sites.google.com/site/bicyclehelmetmythsandfacts/#TOC-Myth-1:-Helmets-do-not-provide-any-protection-to-the-head-in-the-event-of-head-impact-crash.
Erke and Elvik stated: “There is evidence of increased accident risk per cycling-km for cyclists wearing a helmet. In Australia and New Zealand, the increase is estimated to be around 14 per cent.”
http://www.cycle-helmets.com/norway.pdf page 28.
Details from New South Wales, Australia reported the number of injuries to children compared to the level of cycling activity, to provide estimates of the ‘equivalent number of injuries for pre law numbers of cyclists’, Table 2 in the report. The equivalent number of injuries for pre-law number of cyclists increased from 1310 (384 head + 926 other injuries) in 1991 to 2083 (488 head + 1595 other injuries) in 1993.
Robinson DL; Head injuries and bicycle helmet laws; Accid Anal Prev, 28, 4: p 463-475, 1996 http://www.cycle-helmets.com/robinson-head-injuries.pdf
In 2012 the New Zealand Medical Journal published ‘Evaluation of New Zealand’s bicycle law’. The ‘Summary’ includes;
Cycling usage reduced by 51% (average hours cycled per person, % change from 89–90 to 06-09).
Cyclist’s injury risk per hour increased by 20–32%.
The report mentions the findings of Sandra Tin Tin et al;
‘Of particular concern are children and adolescents who have experienced the greatest increase in the risk of cycling injuries despite a substantial decline in the amount of cycling over the past two decades’
Clarke, CF, Evaluation of New Zealand’s bicycle law, NZMJ 10 February 2012, Vol 125 No 1349
http://journal.nzma.org.nz/journal/125-1349/5046/
Data for Alberta, Canada reported;
‘Surveys in Edmonton in 2000 (pre-law) and 2004 (post-law) suggest that cycling by children and teenagers has been significantly reduced compared with adults (59% children, 41% teenagers) (Hagel et al, 2006). Later surveys across several Albertan cities showed that child cycling had gone down by 56% and teenage cycling by 27% (BHRF, 1250; Karkhaneh, 2011)’.
and
‘Surprising stats suggest bike-accident head injuries have increased since Alberta passed a mandatory helmet law.’
http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1055.html
“For Canada, Clarke provided information suggesting helmet use may have contributed to an increase in the accident rate.”http://www.cycle-helmets.com/canada-helmet-assessment.doc .
Refer; ‘A case for revising cycle helmet advice in the Highway Code’
http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/WrittenEvidence.svc/EvidenceHtml/7077
There are a wide range of helmets available with various designs. They are tested to standards that do not include rotational acceleration aspects. One main cause of severe brain injury is rotational accelerations and helmets incur more impacts than a bare head due to their increased size. An element of uncertainty exists about how safe or otherwise any particular helmet may be. Curnow provided a scientific evaluation explaining the importance of rotational acceleration and the background leading to its understanding. Refer Curnow B, BICYCLE HELMETS: A SCIENTIFIC EVALUATION, Transportation Accident Analysis and Prevention, 2008 http://cyclehelmets.org/papers/p787.pdf,