#1
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more helmet lies
http://tinyurl.com/a4q8a
Fromm the Nottingham Evening Post: "The Evening Post's Use Your Head campaign encourages people to wear cycling helmets. It was launched earlier this year to help reduce the number of injuries and deaths on bikes. "Latest figures showed that 100,000 children are injured on bicycles each year. About 70% of those who die suffer head injuries. Helmets reduce the risk of such injury by 85% and the risk of brain injury by almost 90%." regards, Ian SMith -- |\ /| no .sig |o o| |/ \| |
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#2
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more helmet lies
"Ian Smith" wrote in message ... http://tinyurl.com/a4q8a Fromm the Nottingham Evening Post: "The Evening Post's Use Your Head campaign encourages people to wear cycling helmets. It was launched earlier this year to help reduce the number of injuries and deaths on bikes. "Latest figures showed that 100,000 children are injured on bicycles each year. About 70% of those who die suffer head injuries. Helmets reduce the risk of such injury by 85% and the risk of brain injury by almost 90%." It also says:- "Save your skull" is being run by Mountain Bike UK (MBUK) to ensure all off-road cyclists wear proper head gear. Many people here have said in the past that they wear a helmet off road (by which I think we mean something a little more extreme than a Sustrans route or the local towpath). The paper -- perhaps with the connivance of those issuing the press release are allowing a confusion as to the definition of 'off-road' and are promoting B****'s discredited propaganda figures which, even if true, elide from 100,000 injuries (mostly grazed knees) to 70% of (a vastly smaller number of) deaths involve (but may not be the primary cause of death) a head injury (which might be superficial lacerations of no significant risk to life while what killed you was the multiple internal injuries elsewhere). Clarity, honesty and journalism are, sadly, not closely related arts. T |
#3
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more helmet lies
I submit that on or about 02 Sep 2005 19:01:28 GMT, the person known
to the court as Ian Smith made a statement in Your Honour's bundle) to the following effect: "Latest figures showed that 100,000 children are injured on bicycles each year. About 70% of those who die suffer head injuries. Helmets reduce the risk of such injury by 85% and the risk of brain injury by almost 90%." Those "latest figures" have been traced to a report about *American* cycling injuries, and have zero relevance to the UK. The other claims are, of course, standard bull****. Guy -- http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk "To every complex problem there is a solution which is simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken |
#4
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more helmet lies
Tony W wrote:
"Ian Smith" wrote in message ... http://tinyurl.com/a4q8a Fromm the Nottingham Evening Post: "The Evening Post's Use Your Head campaign encourages people to wear cycling helmets. snip The paper -- perhaps with the connivance of those issuing the press release are allowing a confusion as to the definition of 'off-road' and are promoting B****'s discredited propaganda figures encore du snip Clarity, honesty and journalism are, sadly, not closely related arts. Many years ago, when I was growing up in Nottingham, the Evening Post was crap. It appears that little has changed. |
#5
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more helmet lies
Reply sent:
Your story says: "Latest figures showed that 100,000 children are injured on bicycles each year." What figures? The only source I know of for that figure is a paper by Lee and Mann, of the Bicycle Helmet Initiative Trust, which is in turn referenced to a paper about *American* cycling injuries, which is of no relevance to the UK at all. If this figure is accurate then the severity of these injuries is actually unusually low, since only around 2% of them merited admission to hospital. http://www.cyclehelmets.org/mf.html#1100 "About 70% of those who die suffer head injuries." This is true for all impact deaths. I have figures from the Department of Health which show that children hospitalised for cycling injuries are less likely to suffer head injury than those hospitalised for injuries sustained as pedestrians. In both cases the major cause of serious and fatal injury is motor traffic, which accounts for one in ten child injury admissions but half of fatalities. The number one thing the Evening Post could do to reduce serious and fatal head injuries in children is to persuade readers to drive slower and more carefully! The second-best thing is probably to promote good quality cycle training, and third would be a campaign on bike maintenance - perhaps sponsoring "Dr. Bike" sessions in shopping centres, schools and other places where cyclists congregate. I have comments from both TRL and the BMA which show that, of all common cycle safety interventions, helmets are the *least* effective in reducing cyclist injuries. "Helmets reduce the risk of such injury by 85% and the risk of brain injury by almost 90%." False. Helmets do almost nothing to reduce the risk of serious or fatal brain injury (there is very little evidence relating to severe injury, and actually much of it shows that helmeted cyclists fare worse). The figure of 85% of head injuries and 88% of brain injuries (brain injuries being, in this case, almost exclusively mild concussion - you did know that, didn't you?) is speculative and has never been repeated even by the same research group. In fact, the figure they found in their study was about 75%, as compared with a 73% "reduction" in broken legs, but they decided that the "real" figure was higher. And it wasn't that helmets "prevented" these injuries, but that the helmet group in the study (mainly white, middle-class riders in family groups on bike paths) had a lower incidence of head injury than the "case" group, which was more likely to be black or Hispanic, low-income, male, riding alone on city streets. To represent the difference between these groups as being entirely due to helmet use is clearly foolish, yet that is what the claim you repeat amounts to. There are other reasons why this figure is false, see http://www.cyclehelmets.org/mf.html#1131 The 85%/88% figure is so widely quoted that it is hard to believe it is specious, but in fact a recent study showed that almost all widely cited studies of this type (observational case-control) turn out to e either completely wrong, or at least greatly over-optimistic. One might be given to speculate why, with such an enormous range of studies to choose from, with figures for efficacy ranging from the negative to 85%/88%, it is always the largest numbers which are cited, despite the fact that anybody reasonably well-informed knows they are false. It is almost as if lower (but more accurate figures) are not impressive enough! Guy -- http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk "To every complex problem there is a solution which is simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken |
#6
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more helmet lies
in message , Tony W
') wrote: "Ian Smith" wrote in message ... http://tinyurl.com/a4q8a Fromm the Nottingham Evening Post: "The Evening Post's Use Your Head campaign encourages people to wear cycling helmets. It was launched earlier this year to help reduce the number of injuries and deaths on bikes. "Latest figures showed that 100,000 children are injured on bicycles each year. About 70% of those who die suffer head injuries. Helmets reduce the risk of such injury by 85% and the risk of brain injury by almost 90%." It also says:- "Save your skull" is being run by Mountain Bike UK (MBUK) to ensure all off-road cyclists wear proper head gear. Many people here have said in the past that they wear a helmet off road (by which I think we mean something a little more extreme than a Sustrans route or the local towpath). The paper -- perhaps with the connivance of those issuing the press release are allowing a confusion as to the definition of 'off-road' and are promoting B****'s discredited propaganda figures I think there's also the point that many in the Mountain Bike community genuinely believe that polystyrene foam deflector beanies are magic and will save your life in all incidents. Fortunately, the vast majority of mountain bike falls have much lower closing speed than road traffic crashes, and in an off-road environment there are a lot of things to fall on which aren't very hard. But nevertheless, if you come off hard enough onto a rock or a tree, it's pretty easy to achieve the sorts of energies which make a helmet irrelevant. Helmets /are/ more relevant of-road. But they still aren't magic. -- (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/ There's nae Gods, an there's precious few heroes but there's plenty on the dole in th Land o th Leal; And it's time now, tae sweep the future clear o th lies o a past that we know wis never real. |
#7
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more helmet lies
Many years ago, when I was growing up in Nottingham, the Evening Post was crap. It appears that little has changed. I was once pictured in the NEP |
#8
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more helmet lies
Simon Brooke wrote:
I think there's also the point that many in the Mountain Bike community genuinely believe that polystyrene foam deflector beanies are magic and will save your life in all incidents. Fortunately, the vast majority of mountain bike falls have much lower closing speed than road traffic crashes, and in an off-road environment there are a lot of things to fall on which aren't very hard. But nevertheless, if you come off hard enough onto a rock or a tree, it's pretty easy to achieve the sorts of energies which make a helmet irrelevant. Helmets /are/ more relevant of-road. But they still aren't magic. Its the one time I still wear a helmet. Its because mountain biking involves a lot of falling off (if you are trying properly) and a lot of that falling off happens at low speeds onto ground that can be quite lumpy with rocky bits pointing out of it (which negates the usual protection where you tend to be able to hold your head off the road using your shoulders in a slow fall). But I agree that it won't help you in a high speed fall on a rocky descent or into a tree except for the usual scratches and grazes proviso. -- Tony "I did make a mistake once - I thought I'd made a mistake but I hadn't" Anon |
#9
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more helmet lies
MSeries wrote:
Many years ago, when I was growing up in Nottingham, the Evening Post was crap. It appears that little has changed. I was once pictured in the NEP So was I. We had a presentation by the mayor for all the cubs getting their Gold Arrow awards. I bet Mum's got the paper somewhere. |
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