"Scott, Charles" <[log in to unmask]>typed
> If one takes any activity which carries a risk of head injury and then
> measures whether people would have less injury if they all wore helmets then
> I suspect helmet wearing would be found to be a good thing by reducing head
> trauma in the population.
Would that it were so. The evidence that it does is flimsier than a
cycle helmet...
http://www.cyclehelmets.org/mf.html#1101
> Extend the logic and the state should then make
> wearing a helmet compulsory every time an individual engages in that
> activity. So, in addition to cycling, activities such as crossing the
> road, going up a ladder, changing light bulbs, walking on flagstoned
> pavements, drinking alcohol, football, rugby and any contact sport etc etc
> require a helmet.
Too true.
Helmets are not totally benign anyway.
My head is almost as broad as it is long, making it almost impossible to
achieve a stable fitting.
Poor helmet fit can lead to laryngeal injury following minor frontal impact.
Making a head larger and heavier makes it more likely to strike
anything, can increase likelihood of neck injury (last week's BMJ showed
this -statistially insignificantly- in snowsporters)
> My point is that legislation is sometimes not the best way forward. If
> cyclists do not want to wear a helmet, fine. Let's send them the bill as
> can be done for road crashes.
Cycle helmets may *cause* some diffuse axonal injury and SDH by
converting a glancing blow into a rotational impact...
> Money talks, and the police will be too busy
> arresting huntsmen to worry about cycle helmets.
> PS I cycle without a helmet because they're spooney.
I don't cycle anymore. I used to wear a helmet, even though overheating
my head made my MS symptoms worse.
It's nice not to have the smelly hair I had when I wore my helmet, nice
not to attend to fainting overheated cyclists on the café floor, nice
not to wear a sweat-bucket whilst walking/waddling, even though more
pedestrians die of head injury than cyclists, per mile travelled...
--
Helen D. Vecht: [log in to unmask]
Edgware.
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