Cycling Forums - View Single Post - Sierra Club -- cycling is scary

01-19-2005, 11:59 AM

Something that I thought was misleading was the figure that 85% of the people
who were fataly injured whilst cycling were not wearing a helmet.

I am not sure if this is true, but for the sake of argument, lets us accept it.
The thing is that most of the bicycle fatalities are suffered not by competent
cyclists but people on bicycles operating the bikes in an intrinsically unsafe
manner. I doubt very much that had all these people been wearing helmets that
the fatality rates would have been decreased much.

I think the fact that so many cyclists who are fatally injured are not wearing
helmets has little to do with helmets protecting people from fatal injury and
more to do with the fact that there is a class of "cyclists" out there who take
virtually no safety precautions like riding in a safe, prudent and lawful
manner and people like that are not likely to wear helmets.

01-19-2005, 11:59 AM	#164 (permalink)
Pbwalther Guest Posts: n/a	Re: Sierra Club -- cycling is scary Something that I thought was misleading was the figure that 85% of the people who were fataly injured whilst cycling were not wearing a helmet. I am not sure if this is true, but for the sake of argument, lets us accept it. The thing is that most of the bicycle fatalities are suffered not by competent cyclists but people on bicycles operating the bikes in an intrinsically unsafe manner. I doubt very much that had all these people been wearing helmets that the fatality rates would have been decreased much. I think the fact that so many cyclists who are fatally injured are not wearing helmets has little to do with helmets protecting people from fatal injury and more to do with the fact that there is a class of "cyclists" out there who take virtually no safety precautions like riding in a safe, prudent and lawful manner and people like that are not likely to wear helmets.