That depends entirely on how you fall off your bike, which depends on your speed and numerous other factors. The problem here is that it's pretty hard to tell after the fact whether a death would have been prevented by a helmet. We can guess, speculate but it's hard to measure the exact forces exerted - and also how someone's biological material will react to that (the brain).
In all my reading around this issue, those that don't want to wear helmets don't tend to wear them for fashion reasons, and interpret the stats they read to insinuate that helmets don't save lives. They don't like how it looks, feels, or that they will be teased for wearing one. I'd rather live to see the next day than care about what a helmet looks like.
And one other point to end on, it's not just deaths we're talking about here. Many people have suffered brain injuries from the impact of falling off their bike. Imagine there was something you could put on your head that would prevent that impact.
> I'd rather live to see the next day than care about what a helmet looks like.
Do you wear one while walking? Or hiking? There's also an increased risk of brain injury from these activities.
Most people I know don't wear one, because the combination of the discomfort, hassle, inconvenience and appearance aren't worth the perceived low increased risk of cycling compared to, for example, walking.
I wear one when rock climbing, kayaking, snowboarding, skiing, motorcycle, bicycle, skateboard, football, etc. Pretty much any time I go over 8mph. I even considered one in aussie rules football but they were hard to find in the states.
I found that helmets for winter sports are better than hats. They don't soak up sweat like a hat does so do better in cold and are better vented than a hat as well. They also really help with the trees.
It's also interesting that they used to be "nerdy" on ski slopes in the US, then several major states required everyone under 18 to wear them. Now 80% (feels like) of kids wear them all the time, so you actually look wierd if you don't wear a helmet.
I definitely wear them on bikes and have needed them (and bounced off of them) many times. I tend to tuck when I go off the bike so I bounce the back of my helmet. There's a heart warming sensation of relief when you hear that hollow thunk sound of the helmet taking the blow on the pavement, tree, hardpack, rock, etc, with no bad effects on you.
Also on my commute I tend to hit 45 mph multiple times in the first 2 miles (I drop 500 ft in 2 miles and I feel it's safer to do 35 like the cars on the nicely paved winding suburban road than to sit in the bike lane).
Finally... I made this guy (who hates helmets) put one on after the kite pulled him up into the goal posts on a previous run. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PGKG5ZFMQg He thanked me a year later.
That's a completely different situation than the average Dutch cyclist faces. First, there are no hills to be seen, so not that easy to pick up speed. Especially on a city bike which is 99% of the fleet. It's unusual to even reach 20km/h. People carry their shopping, kids, furniture and pets in them. They cycle in whatever they are wearing - suits, skirts, jeans, whatever; the fact you can just hop on a bike without having to gear up makes it much more attractive to everyday life.
There was also this study from a university in Utrecht showing that [in the Netherlands] cyclists wearing helmets are more careless and cause more accidents, nullifying any safety benefit...
> There was also this study from a university in Utrecht showing that [in the Netherlands] cyclists wearing helmets are more careless and cause more accidents, nullifying any safety benefit..
Are there any links in English to that study?
Someone said only people racing (or with racing bikes) trend to wear helmet in Netherlands. Knowing that it feels like that study confuses correlation with causation, but a university probably knows more than I do, hence why I'd like to read the study. Maybe it's just the press getting the wrong conclusion out of the study for agenda purposes.
I don't know. The helmets are not weird nor nerdy. They save lives even though you might not need it ever if you're lucky. I always wear helmet, high viz, reflective vest, lights everywhere... You know, I don't want to be that guy in the statistics.
Nice link, thanks. That seems to be another education issue: Drivers think cyclists with helmets are more experienced, so they don't feel the need to leave as much room as they do with "less experienced" cyclists.
It is an interesting point and I didn't know about it.
Almost unrelated, but I've found this part of the article funny - shows how we have to be careful with grand headlines and look at the article itself:
> Henry Marsh, who works at St George’s Hospital in Tooting, London, said that many of his patients who have been involved in bike accidents have been wearing helmets that were ‘too flimsy’ to be beneficial.
Well, no shit Sherlock. The cases where the helmet helped don't end up in your hands. Guy's a neurosurgeon.
Yeah, I guess you've got a good point there. Also, the infrastructures to cycle are not as good here as in The Netherlands.
I just think, based on people's comments, that there's some silly stigma associated to the helmets like "they're ugly" or "you look silly with it". I've only started cycling again a few years ago, after a childhood of cycling every day without any safety gear; it was hard at first to make myself comfortable with the idea of wearing a helmet. Some time later it just feels natural and I actually get worried when I see people without helmet.
It seems to be something similar to the seat belt. It took time for people to get used to it and nowadays I still see that problem in some countries (usually with old people in small towns).
I wear a helmet for bicycling, in-line skating, snowboarding and whitewater kayaking. In the case of the first three sports, the helmet has saved me from nasty head hits:
- Two over-the-handlebars crashes on my bike at relatively low speed (one when mountain biking).
- A low tree limb and several backwards falls when inline skating.
- Countless backwards falls when learning to snowboard.
For whitewater kayaking, a helmet is effectively mandatory because head strikes against underwater rocks may knock you unconscious in rapids (and because very few groups will paddle with somebody lacking standard safety gear). I once saw a guy paddling in a hockey mask with a cage, which is non-standard for whitewater kayaking. I later learned he had bounced that face cage off an underwater rock once.
As for cars, well, I once hit my head against the door frame in a car accident (no side air bags in that vehicle) and ended up needing to work half time for over 6 months. Even minor concussions can be no fun at all. Happily I made a full recovery.
I like my helmets. I earn my living using my brain, and I intend to strictly minimize the risk of future concussions.
Do you wear a helmet when going for a run? What about going for a walk?
Most Dutch riders are cycling slower than a running pace.
I noticed that you categorized bicycling as a sport. For most Dutch people, bicycling is not a sport but a form of transportation. Commuting by car is a form of transportation, just like Formula 1 is a sport form which uses cars. The safety requirements are quite different between those two, just like they are different between those who mountain bike as a sport and those who use a city bicycle to get groceries.
> Most Dutch riders are cycling slower than a running pace.
Just to confirm, this is absolutely true. When running, I overtake bicyclists all the time. Especially uphill :) (by which I mean traffic overpass, not actual hills of course :p)
Personally I go a bit faster on my bike, but not much. 15 km/h (9.3mph) usually, and if I go much faster than that, I find that it does indeed get a lot more dangerous! Amazing, right? So, I don't do that. Just another clever Dutch workaround, I guess :-P
Wearing a helmet is of course never a bad thing. But studies has also shown (on mobile, can't find now) that people see helmets as really cumbersome, and that many of the potential cyclists chose another mode of transporation if they have to use a helmet. Seems strange to me, I ride with a helmet every day. But each to his/her own.
[…] In contrast, despite increases to at least 75% helmet wearing, the proportion of head injuries in cyclists admitted or treated at hospital declined by an average of only 13%. The percentage of cyclists with head injuries after collisions with motor vehicles in Victoria declined by more, but the proportion of head injured pedestrians also declined; the two followed a very similar trend. These trends may have been caused by major road safety initiatives introduced at the same time as the helmet law and directed at both speeding and drink-driving. The initiatives seem to have been remarkably effective in reducing road trauma for all road users, perhaps affecting the proportions of victims suffering head injuries as well as total injuries. The benefits of cycling, even without a helmet, have been estimated to outweigh the hazards by a factor of 20 to 1 (Hillman 1993; Cycle helmets—the case for and against. Policy Studies Institute, London). Consequently, a helmet law, whose most notable effect was to reduce cycling, may have generated a net loss of health benefits to the nation. Despite the risk of dying from head injury per hour being similar for unhelmeted cyclists and motor vehicle occupants, cyclists alone have been required to wear head protection. Helmets for motor vehicle occupants are now being marketed and a mandatory helmet law for these road users has the potential to save 17 times as many people from death by head injury as a helmet law for cyclists without the adverse effects of discouraging a healthy and pollution free mode of transport.[1]
In all my reading around this issue, those that don't want to wear helmets don't tend to wear them for fashion reasons, and interpret the stats they read to insinuate that helmets don't save lives. They don't like how it looks, feels, or that they will be teased for wearing one. I'd rather live to see the next day than care about what a helmet looks like.
And one other point to end on, it's not just deaths we're talking about here. Many people have suffered brain injuries from the impact of falling off their bike. Imagine there was something you could put on your head that would prevent that impact.