Well, it finally happened.......

HK12K said:

On the fence as well. I hate the idea of criminalizing children, or their parents, over issues that are frankly none of the government's business. Especially in America, where you're on the hook for your own healthcare. Doesn't sit right with me.

I survived childhood as well, bouncing baby boy and all that. That said the world would probably be a better place if we stopped trying to Nerf it and just let Natural Selection do it's one job.

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Ya, but there are a lot of kids in this world that need protection from their parents. That's where I'm on the fence.

E-HP said:

TDB said:

HK12K said:

I vote for freedom, personally. It's your head, do what you want with it.

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Your choices can have much broader implications.

Should others have to pay for your freedom when you make insurance, disability or welfare claims?

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In America, we recently observed Memorial Day. Another way to look at it, is that many brave men and women fought and died for the freedoms we enjoy, including the free speech.

By placing a dollar amount on that freedom, and allowing it to be taken away, is effectively saying that the cost of insurance, disability or welfare claims is of greater value than those lives. Of course, you have the freedom to state that opinion, because of those men and women died in order for you to express it as well.

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So, you're saying those freedoms include poor choices and freeloading of the rest of society. God bless America!

In an ideal world, good governance is meant to do its best to protect people like me from people like you. lol

TDB said:

In an ideal world, good governance is meant to do its best to protect me from people like you. lol

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Still you ignore the recorded fact that helmets don't save lives or taxpayer money in the big picture.

TDB said:

So, you're saying those freedoms include poor choices and freeloading of the rest of society. God bless America!

In an ideal world, good governance is meant to do its best to protect me from people like you. lol

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I fully support your right to express your opinion. :thumb:

TDB said:

HK12K said:

If that's the governmental healthcare structure they chose, then yeah, that's how it works. Though I do understand your point, where exactly does it end? Mandate PPE, ban soda, alcohol, etc? Slippery slope.

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Money doesn't grow on trees. Whether it is government or private I pay one way or another and have the right and expectation those "funds" to be managed responsibly and that includes managing/limiting my liability/responsibility for your bad choices.

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No, you don't get to dictate my choices. That is absolutely not how any of this works.

TDB said:

In an ideal world, good governance is meant to do its best to protect people like me...

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Really?
Maybe you need to be protected from yourself, if you are so insecure as to believe that someone else not wearing a helmet is a threat to your well being.

Read it again.

Chalo said:

Still you ignore the recorded fact that helmets don't save lives or taxpayer money in the big picture.

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Whose "facts"?
Those of the single study you keep referencing as gospel authored by Dr. Ian Walker, an armchair-academic whose anti-helmet scratchings have been repeatedly debunked using sound science (vs Walker's opinions/conjecture based on non-statistically significant datas)?

Again, science (vs Walker's determinations which used non-statistically-significant observations) was applied to Walker's actual data and have proven his thesis incorrect USING HIS OWN DATA....not "chart-fitted" new data to fit an anti-Walker agenda.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3783373/
and another...
https://helmets.org/walkerchartsrev2b.pdf
and another debunking his methods.
http://outthereliving.com/Ian_Walker_move_over_pls.pdf

Please go away until you can find some "recorded facts" that can actually stand up to critique of real science.

pullin-gs said:

Chalo said:

Still you ignore the recorded fact that helmets don't save lives or taxpayer money in the big picture.

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Whose "facts"?

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USDOT and others keep records of how many cyclists are killed on the roads every year. As a proportion of total cyclists, this number hasn't decreased significantly during the span of time when helmet use went from 0% to 50% or more. If helmets worked-- not just to prevent injury from specific head impacts, but to prevent the total number of injuries and fatalities in a population-- then the total fatality rate would reflect that. It doesn't.

If you want protection when you hit your head, wear a helmet. Also, if you want to hit your head more often, wear a helmet. Statistically it evens out.

Chalo said:

pullin-gs said:

Chalo said:

Still you ignore the recorded fact that helmets don't save lives or taxpayer money in the big picture.

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Whose "facts"?

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USDOT and others keep records of how many cyclists are killed on the roads every year. As a proportion of total cyclists, this number hasn't decreased significantly during the span of time when helmet use went from 0% to 50% or more. If helmets worked-- not just to prevent injury from specific head impacts, but to prevent the total number of injuries and fatalities in a population-- then the total fatality rate would reflect that. It doesn't.

If you want protection when you hit your head, wear a helmet. Also, if you want to hit your head more often, wear a helmet. Statistically it evens out.

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Trend charts proportion deaths over time (Helmet use time span went from 0 to 50%) would be helpful here......please post link.

pullin-gs said:

Chalo said:

As a proportion of total cyclists, this number hasn't decreased significantly during the span of time when helmet use went from 0% to 50% or more. If helmets worked-- not just to prevent injury from specific head impacts, but to prevent the total number of injuries and fatalities in a population-- then the total fatality rate would reflect that. It doesn't.

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Trend charts proportion deaths over time (Helmet use time span went from 0 to 50%) would be helpful here......please post link.

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Here's the best fit to the time period of interest I could find in a reasonable amount of searching. It covers the period from 1985 to 2017. Bicycle helmets were cuckoo bird stuff before around 1990, after which they were marketed to the public and lobbied to legislators rabidly, with resultant increase in adoption rates.

From https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590198220301305

Fig. 2. Percent change from 1985 of bicyclist exposure (left) and fatality rates (right).

Census: Child population ages 7–17 years; adult ages 18+; total ages 7 +.

NSGA: Child bicycle participants ages 7–17 years; adult ages 18+; total ages 7 +.

ACS: Adult bicycle commuters ages 16+ years.

NHTS: Child bicycle trips ages 5–15 years; adult ages 16+; total ages 5+.

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In terms of fatality rates, population-based adult fatality rates increased moderately, with the high in 2016 being 41.1% higher than 1985 (statistically significant; CI 41.137–41.138). The NSGA-based adult fatality rates show a strong increase, with the high in 2016 being 142.5% higher than 1985 (statistically significant; CI 142.503–142.520). ACS and NHTS both show little overall change through the 1990s, followed by a decrease in the last 10–15 years (2017 was 19.1% and 35.3% lower than 1985 for ACS and NHTS, respectively (both statistically significant; CI -19.103 – -19.019; CI -35.580 – -35.084)).

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Do you see anything here that looks like helmets saving a lot of lives as they became widely used? Because I don't.

Seems just from the charts that child fatality dropped 75% 1985 to 2015

I don’t see any chart for helmet use, i assume that the larger part of the helmet adopters are children. That’s what it was here, also before regulation

It's in the link Chalo provided, although it was not given its own chart.

helmet usage has helped improve safety

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the first U.S. helmet laws were proposed in California in 1986, and many states started implementing their own helmet laws focused on children shortly thereafter

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helmet laws and helmet use have been found to be associated with lower fatality rates for child bicyclists and to have protective effects for traumatic brain injury, head and neck injury, and hospitalization for child bicyclists (McAdams et al., 2018; Meehan et al., 2013)

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Back on topic: one week update I'm feeling better although still feel "foggy" for about an hour after I wake up. Still resting quite a bit. Doc says things should be better after another week.

Road rash is healing up VERY nicely....found that motorcle guys use Nexcare Tegaderm dressing for rash...10x better than neosporin&gauze! This stuff is amazing!

Chalo said:

You can consciously decide to ride with a helmet, just as carefully as if you weren't wearing one. But you can't make car drivers around you drive as carefully as if you weren't wearing one.

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Yep. Which is why those "helmetless countries" that have such low fatality rates are safer - because they really do have separate bike lanes, physically separated from traffic.

Risk compensation (the term I have become accustomed to) is everywhere and can't be offset by any one person's actions when other people are present. When the risk is car drivers, much (maybe most) of the risk compensation is out of your hands.

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A lot of it is. Not most. When I drive I see a very wide range of bicycle behavior, from experienced bikers on racing bikes riding in very predictable pelotons to teens without helmets, riding on beater bikes that have been stuck in one gear for the past 3 years, darting in and out of 30mph traffic. That's their decision, and it has a very strong impact on their safety.

Wearing PPE for something that really isn't very dangerous can make it seem dangerous, and may have the opposite of the intended effect by causing others to treat you with disregard (because you're knowingly doing something that obviously must be dangerous).

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You get the opposite effect, usually. People treat "professional looking" riders with more respect. We've seen this in action when we are out on rides. I'm usually the most shabbily dressed person in the group, but we always get more respect as a (mostly) professional looking group than when I ride alone.

Likewise, there is some risk that PPE makes you take more risk than you would otherwise (as mentioned above.) You have to make sure you maintain your own standards of safety even as you add PPE.