I have my mind changed about helmets!

[Mark_Robson]

It is really so simple.....

One asks if helmets can prevent or lessen the severity of a head injury.

One then looks at the next 100 casualties walking through the door of A / E .... and decides whether each head injury could have been less severe or avoided.

ALL the cohort studies suggest that wearing a helmet whilst drinking would give the best benefit by saving most victims.... the group which would show least benefit is always the cyclists!

But it isn't that simple is it? The percentages that your 100 patient study produce would be totally misleading. What if the next 100 patients were cyclists as opposed to drunks?

 

[ufkacbln]

But it isn't that simple is it? The percentages that your 100 patient study produce would be totally misleading. What if the next 100 patients were cyclists as opposed to drunks?

ALL the cohort studies invariably show that cyclists are a minority though.... There is as much likelihood of the next 100 random patients being green aliens with 3 heads than cyclists.

No cohort study has ever shown cyclists to be the majority!

Which brings us back to the main question....

Are we trying to reduce head injuries, or are we happy for non-cycling head injuries to occur when they can be prevented by same simple methods ?

Why should we allow a pedestrian to suffer a head injury and "end up being fed soup through a straw" but take steps to prevent the same outcome in a cyclist?

 

[Red Light]

is it possible that, presuming this to be accurate and true, that the fewer cycling injuries in respect of pedestrian injuries is because they are more likely to wear helmets.

No - that question has already been asked and answered above and the answer is no.

With the stats being injuries/km this does not reflect time out walking/cycling. As most people cycle a km quicker than they walk a km the amount of time out doing the activity would be increasingly more if walking. If these stats were injuries/time then they would be more favorable towards pedestrians

I don't know about you but I walk or cycle to go somewhere, not to pass a set amount of time and go as far as I can in that time. So the per km measure is the right one for comparing going there by foot or cycle. And as noted above, if you consider the average distance walked or cycled a year, the annual risk becomes 3 times worse still for pedestrians.

Therefore does this stat help prove pro helmet wearing?

Wishful thinking on your part - if it proved pro-helmet wearing for cyclists it proved it ten times over for pedestrian helmet wearing. But the sensible answer is it proved neither.

 

[ufkacbln]

[QUOTE 1414984"]
So, I'm not frail elderly, don't get drunk or fight, rarely listen to music while walking and have very good road sense.

Is it therefore safer for me to walk down the road than your statistical group?
[/quote]

Which is part of the issue......

If the same money, effort , zeal and evangelistic fervour was applied to training and educating road users there would be a far better return in terms of safety than helmets for a minirity group of victims

 

[david k]

If a person is outside travelling on which ever mode of transport, they are at more of a risk if our for 2 hours than 1 hour obviously. Therefore I would expect the stat to show injuries compared to time out doing the activity. As you can cycle 4 times quicker than you can walk (using ave walking 3mph, ave cycling 12mph) you would need to cut the injuries for walkers by 75% to be judged on a comparison

 

[Red Light]

If a person is outside travelling on which ever mode of transport, they are at more of a risk if our for 2 hours than 1 hour obviously. Therefore I would expect the stat to show injuries compared to time out doing the activity. As you can cycle 4 times quicker than you can walk (using ave walking 3mph, ave cycling 12mph) you would need to cut the injuries for walkers by 75% to be judged on a comparison

Why? If you are going to the shops and you can cycle there in 15 minutes and walk there in an hour, you are exposed for four times as long when walking so you need to multiply the injuries per hour for walkers up by a factor 4 again to account for the longer time taking us back to where we started (which is not unsurprising given the distance to the shops is to first order the same for all modes of transport but the time to get there varies significantly).

 

[ufkacbln]

If a person is outside travelling on which ever mode of transport, they are at more of a risk if our for 2 hours than 1 hour obviously. Therefore I would expect the stat to show injuries compared to time out doing the activity. As you can cycle 4 times quicker than you can walk (using ave walking 3mph, ave cycling 12mph) you would need to cut the injuries for walkers by 75% to be judged on a comparison

That is why cyclists kill more people than cars each year!

 

[david k]

Why? If you are going to the shops and you can cycle there in 15 minutes and walk there in an hour, you are exposed for four times as long when walking so you need to multiply the injuries per hour for walkers up by a factor 4 again to account for the longer time taking us back to where we started (which is not unsurprising given the distance to the shops is to first order the same for all modes of transport but the time to get there varies significantly).

dont know why you want to factor up by 4, it should be divided by 4.

 

[Red Light]

dont know why you want to factor up by 4, it should be divided by 4.

You've got your logic standing on its head.

Example: trip to the shops of 3 miles. 1 hour walking, 15 minutes cycling.

Risk of getting killed: Cyclist 24 per Bn km; Pedestrian 31 per Bn km

Time for a cyclist to do 1Bn km at 12mph - 5,210,000 hours
Time for a pedestrian to do 1Bn km at 3mph = 20,840,000 hours.

Distance based calculation:

Risk of getting killed in 3 miles:

Cyclist: 1.15E-07 (2.4E-08 per km * 4.8km)
Pedestrian: 1.49E-07 (3.1E-08 per km * 4.8km)

Time based calculation:

24 cyclist deaths per 5,210,000 hours = 4.61E-07 deaths per hour
31 pedestrian deaths per 20,840,000 hours = 1.49E-07 deaths per hour (i.e. your four times lower)

Risk of cyclist death in the 15 minutes of cycling = 0.25*4.61E-07 = 1.15E-07
Risk of pedestrian death in 1 hour of walking = 1.0*1.49E-07 = 1.49E-07

Either way you do it you come back to the same answer (as logic would dictate) that the risk is higher walking than cycling.

If you compare the risks of cycling and walking for a particular journey, it will always come out that way. The only way your proposal works is by comparing the risk of one journey by walking with a completely different journey taking the same time by bike which is a nonsensical comparison.

 

[jethro10]

For me the debate mainly comes down to,

if you substitute cyclist for pedestrian would you still wear a helmet for crossing the road?
the level of risk is very similar as are the consequences.

You cross the road usually in a town? often at crossings designed for such, AND your on the road bit far less often than you are when on a bike.
More often on road, more risk, more protection??? possibly

If I wanted to mitigate the risks of cycling I would be wearing a body protector and a proper helmet (horse riding or motor bike spring to mind)

and If I wanted to mitigate the risk of driving a car into an accident, i'd have a car with a rollcage, plexiglass, a multi point harness, a nomex fire suit, CO2 plumming etc.
Hmmm, but I bet you/we dont do all these either?

Cycle helmets do not provide enough protection to be worth the cost or inconveniance of using them.

cost £30 or less, is this too much to pay? it's a poor night out :-) or a very small fraction of the cost of a bike, or a reasonable bottle of wine.
Inconvenient? It takes 5 seconds to put on, and 5 to take off. 10 seconds per hour or less on an average ride.

Hmmm, not too convinced by your arguments either way.
Overall, there are great risks to life every day, but we plan to avoid or protect against the worst ones, but can't against them all.
Hey, I was a mile away from one of the deaths by Derek Bird, the Cumbria Killer last year. But I don't wear Kevlar vests to work, perhaps I should.
you need to be balanced to your approach to risk
As for wearing a helmet? I have no idea. but far too many arguments are like this one, biased, shallow and meaningless.

Jef

 

[benb]

jethro10, the point is that there are lots of activities, such as walking, that carry a greater risk of head injury than cycling. That's not an opinion, it's a fact borne out by population studies of head injuries. Yet we do not expect or insist that people wear protective headgear for these activities.

Cycling seems to be the only activity where people are trying to force us to wear helmets, and the risks simply don't warrant compulsion.

Most people on this forum are not anti-helmet, but pro-choice. If you want to wear a helmet, then please do so. But don't try and pretend that the evidence shows there is a significant benefit to wearing it.

And BTW, I usually wear a helmet.

 

[italiafirenze]

Hey, I was a mile away from one of the deaths by Derek Bird, the Cumbria Killer last year. But I don't wear Kevlar vests to work, perhaps I should.
you need to be balanced to your approach to risk

When I was younger, the Pepsi Max Big One crashed. No one was killed, there was a couple of injuries I think, but it was big news at the time. All the kids at school used to claim they were there and on the car before it crashed, or the second to last one before it crashed; as if they somehow cheated death.

And the guys at the pub feel like they should've bought one extra raffle ticket when 456 comes out and they had 454 and 455; because they were just one away.

 

[david k]

using your figure:

24 cyclist deaths per 5,210,000 hours = 1 person dies every 217,083 hours cycling
31 pedestrian deaths per 20,840,000 hours = 1 person dies every 672,258 hours walking



Statistically, if i rode for 217,000 hours i would die, where as i would have to walk 672,000 hours to die. walking is therefore around 3 times safer than cycling

 

[ufkacbln]

Which all brings us back to the simple question...

Why not save both lives?

All of this revolves around the assumption that cyclists need saving from certain death, but it is not worth saving the pedestrian!

 

[david k]

i see your point mr paul but would have to disagree. If looking at injuries you need to consider the time exposed to injury to make a fair comparrison. If your only exposed to potential injury a quarter of the time it is obvious that you are not comparing like for like.

IMO seeing it any other way is 'spin' in order to make ones point of view appear more favourable. You and others may see it differently, thats fine but if people post stats they must accept people considering how they are compiled.