Rising deaths stir new debate over helmet laws

Philadelphia Inquirer ^ | 12/01/03 | Joseph A. Gambardello

[Holly_P]

PRAIRIEVILLE, La. - In the smoky, windowless back room of Gail's Diner on Route 61, eight bikers gathered on a recent Sunday morning for a regular meeting of their motorcycle lobbying group.

A few days earlier, a federal agency had released figures showing the average number of motorcyclists killed in crashes had doubled in Louisiana in the first two years after the state repealed its mandatory helmet law.

The bikers at Gail's - a woman and seven men who roared up wearing denim and do-rags - believe that those numbers will be used as ammunition. "Every regular legislative session, there's been an attempt" to reinstitute a helmet law, said Ollie "Laddie" Elkins, president of the Louisiana branch of American Bikers Active Towards Education (ABATE). "So far, we've managed to beat them in committee."

The regular battle over helmets in Louisiana might just be a look into the future of Pennsylvania, where Gov. Rendell signed a law repealing the state's helmet law in September. The Louisiana debate pits avid bikers on one side against safety officials and doctors frustrated with the number of fallen motorcyclists with head injuries arriving at emergency rooms.

Elkins, his long, gray hair secured in a foot-long braid, said his group expected another challenge next year and feared that Gov.-elect Kathleen Blanco would sign it into law if it passes. A new mandatory helmet law would be just fine with emergency-room physicians, who believe allowing motorcyclists to ride without helmets is creating a public health problem.

They point to a Louisiana safety commission report that estimated that 46 deaths and 73 severe injuries could have been avoided if motorcyclists had worn helmets between 1999 and 2002. The study calculated that those casualties cost the citizens of Louisiana $102 million.

Departing Gov. Mike Foster, a biker himself, signed Louisiana's repeal into law in August 1999, saying it represented a move toward "less government."

"Government ought not tell us what we can do to protect ourselves," he said. "We should have enough sense to protect ourselves."

Under the Louisiana law, bikers 18 and older do not have to wear a helmet as long as they have proof of at least $10,000 in medical insurance coverage.

Pennsylvania now allows experienced motorcyclists over 21 to go "lidless." When the Keystone State's law went into effect Sept. 4, Pennsylvania became the 31st state to allow adult motorcyclists to ride without head protection. New Jersey has had a mandatory helmet law since the 1970s.

It's not yet clear that the Louisiana experience will be duplicated in Pennsylvania, but emergency-room physicians around the commonwealth are keeping a count of motorcycle accident casualties with the possible aim of launching a challenge.

Marilyn Heine, president-elect of the Pennsylvania chapter of the American College of Emergency Physicians, said she did not expect any attempt to overturn the law for two years, the time the state House Legislative Budget and Finance Committee has been given to study the effects of the repeal.

Even when its helmet law was in place, Pennsylvania's motorcycle deaths rose 42 percent between 1996 and 2002 - outpacing a 35 percent increase in ridership during that same time. After two decades of steady decline, U.S. motorcycle deaths also are up, by more than 50 percent since 1997.

A motorcyclist is now 26 times more likely to die in a crash than an automobile passenger, with 3,141 killed in 2001. Researchers are still exploring the causes of the sudden rise, and possible culprits include more motorcycles, bigger engines, older riders, increased alcohol consumption, and the repeal of helmet laws.

In a report released at the end of October, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said an average of 26 motorcyclists were killed in Louisiana in the two years before the state's helmet law was changed in 1999, and 55 in the two years after the repeal, a 111 percent increase.

The report, which also said motorcycle deaths increased by 58 percent in Kentucky after the repeal of that state's helmet law, did not specify the cause of deaths or indicate how many of the fatalities were not wearing a helmet.

A report prepared for the Louisiana Highway Safety Commission and issued this year showed that in cases where helmet use was known, bikers not wearing helmets and dying in accidents outnumbered those who did, by 1.6 to 1, after the repeal.

Both reports said the number of registered motorcycles and accidents had jumped in the years after repeal but not at a rate to match the increase in deaths.

"You can make numbers look like anything you want, say anything you want," said Travis "Blackie" Lawless, a St. James Parish motorcycle officer who wears a helmet on the job but does not when he is off-duty unless the weather is bad.

"Not wearing a helmet does not cause an accident," said Lawless, ABATE-Louisiana's vice president. "And just because you have a helmet on does not mean you're going to survive an accident."

The Louisiana study said a possible key factor in that state is that most bikers in Louisiana apparently have not taken a safety course needed to get the license endorsement to operate a motorcycle. Bikers without a motorcycle endorsement account for 62 percent of the fatalities in Louisiana, the report said.

Lawless and Elkins, a retired chemical-plant worker, agreed that many bikers do not have the safety skills needed to ride motorcycles.

"If [a biker] doesn't know his limitations, he is setting himself up for failure," Lawless said.

Still, the study said, "there is convincing evidence that a decline in helmet use is the most important factor contributing to death and severe injury."

Jim Aiken, an emergency-room doctor at New Orleans' Charity Hospital, could not agree more.

He said with certain injuries there is a "golden hour," during which emergency doctors can stabilize a patient and set the stage for recovery - but not with head injuries.

"Head injuries are a distinct form of injury," said Aiken, who also oversees doctors in Louisiana State University's emergency medicine residency program. "Once we get them, the damage is done. Brain injuries are immediate. There is no golden hour. There's a golden minute."

People who suffer head injuries in crashes but survive "often are left with a lingering health issues that are an enormous burden to society," the doctor said.

"Few realize what a horrible, horrible life it can be to be incapacitated," said Aiken, also a member of the American College of Emergency Physicians. "Being confined can be very painful not only to yourself but to your family as well."

He said the $10,000 in insurance coverage bikers are required to carry to ride helmetless would come nowhere near covering the cost of a lifetime of care, which often falls to the state.

But to the bikers, getting out on the highway on a Harley unencumbered with a helmet is a freedom issue, one with risk but a matter of choice.

"When it's your time, it's your time," said David Metige, a biker who also is a police officer. "I want to do something I enjoy. It's a feeling you can't match. A lot of people don't understand that."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Contact staff writer Joseph Gambardello at 856-779-3868 or jgambardello@phillynews.com.

[biblewonk]

What about people in cars who are wearing seatbelts who would have had fewer injuries if they had also been wearing a helmet? We could get really anal about this. By far most of the 43,000 dead on highways last year died in cars. Look at the safety equipment worn by race car drivers. If we want to get series about the body count we will go there.

[archy]

All depends on what kind of impacts you're expecting. Unless I knew for certain that I wouldn't land on my face, I wouldn't choose any of the open-face or half-helmets.

Your choice. I would not presume to choose for you, nor try to force upon you a helmet with less protective value than you'd feel comfortable with. But I don't care at all for *Darth Vader* helmets with lower face crosspieces.

Beyond that, what types of forces to the head and neck are most prevalent in bike accidents? I don't know. I do know that one of the biggest dangers is to the brain, and that's what modern MC helmets are designed to try to prevent, by reducing the acclerations experienced by the skull, thus keeping the brain from slapping up against the inside of the skull.

See following. It starts out:

It was on a flawless spring morning, May 5, 1985, that Larry McAfee, a 29-year-old mechanical engineer, decided, on an impulse, to take his motorcycle for a ride with friends on the mountain roads north of his suburban Atlanta home. Hours later, traveling no more than 10 m.p.h., he hit a curve, fell, and as his head snapped back, the base of his helmet crushed his top two vertebrae (as in Figure #2).

"There was not another mark on him," says Larry's mother, Amelia.

Yet in that split second, the 6'6", 240-lb. McAfee, an avid outdoorsman, hunter and fledgling parachutist, had sustained what the medical profession calls a "complete injury," one that would leave him permanently paralyzed from the neck down -- unable to walk, eat or even breathe again unaided.

Consider that in many ejection seats, the pilot ejects THROUGH the plexiglass bubble canopy cover, as a cannon shell shoots him through the bubble. The seat design is supposed to clear his way through it, but sometimes things don't break away as planned, or icing or battle damage adds problems beyond *routine* emergency ejections. And so he wears a helmet, a rather expensive one, and heavy both for the protection it has to deliver and the radio and other electronical equipment built in.

You look around, You'll find plenty of bike helmets with an arched neck relief. But you'll also find way too many without it.

I wonder, too, if an impact to the head big enough to break your neck while wearing one of those helmets (like the three fullface models in the top row) would do your head a pretty big injury?

It doesn't take an impact at all. Just the inertia of a backward parachute landing fall during a windy day landing was enough to snap the spine of one Kansas skydiver I knew. He landed in soft sand, and the imprints of his heels and three points of contact- not including his head- were clearly visable and he hadn;t been dragged an inch. His helmet left a clear imprint where it had struck the ground to his right side AFTER the damage to his neck had been done, and he no longer had control of his body.

So many questions, so few answers. Do you have any links to any unbiased sources of information on this subject? i.e. not ABATE, not the Snell foundation.

The Air Force school of aerospace medicine had some pretty good data on helmets worn during ejection seat work, not directly related to motorcycle use, but close. And the DOT and NTSB refusal to certify or specify *approved* helmets suggests that they're comprised of legislation-writers and extortionists, not technicians with any background in such things. Indeed, a lack of real scientific data has been the cause for several states findings that helmet laws were unconstitutional in their particular state.

There MIGHT be some worthwhile foreign studies....

-archy-/-

All asphalt-based bike racers I'm familiar with wear fullface helmets. And while I've often seen them fall and hit their heads and get up and walk away, broken necks seem to be very rare. http://usff.com/hldl/report/3rdEditiona.html#R302

[-YYZ-]

Helmet standards specify how many G's, for how long, a test headform inside the helmet can sustain in a variety of impacts. The peak G's allowed are typically in the hundreds, albeit for a very short time. The helmets are designed to reduce the decceleration experienced by the skull, and thus the brain inside, to the point that the brain will not be slapped up against the inside of the skull hard enough to damage the brain, either directly, or from bruising and the subsequent swelling.

[archy]

Funny thing, having said all the above in affirming my belief in the effectiveness of helmets, I am still anti- seatbelt and helmet laws, for reasons that I have described previously. There is no legitimate public interest in individuals' use or non-use of helmets.

There may be some public interest in prohibiting the sale of helmets that cause worse injuries, or at least from mislabeling them as *safety* helmets. And there are public liability lawsuit questions also associated with such equipment so mislabeled, which may be a matter of some public interest, if only to prevent clogging up the courts with such cases.

In general, I prefer to see the marketplace take care of such things. But that's kind of hard on those who think they're buying safety equipment, and are instead buying the very instrument of their own destruction.

-archy-/-

[archy]

Funny thing, having said all the above in affirming my belief in the effectiveness of helmets, I am still anti- seatbelt and helmet laws, for reasons that I have described previously. There is no legitimate public interest in individuals' use or non-use of helmets.

There may be some public interest in prohibiting the sale of helmets that cause worse injuries, or at least from mislabeling them as *safety* helmets. And there are public liability lawsuit questions also associated with such equipment so mislabeled, which may be a matter of some public interest, if only to prevent clogging up the courts with such cases.

In general, I prefer to see the marketplace take care of such things. But that's kind of hard on those who think they're buying safety equipment, and are instead buying the very instrument of their own destruction.

-archy-/-

[newgeezer]

Just a couple weeks ago, I saw on the news a video clip where a woman said something to the effect of, "If it [whatever 'it' was] saves just one life, it really doesn't matter what it cost."

Oh, brudda... In that case, let's start by mandating the national speed limit at 25 MPH, 15 MPH, or even ZERO. At zero, we'll see an added benefit. Our oil consumption will fall dramatically, such that we won't be funding terrorists anymore!

[archy]

Seems that it should be pretty easy to design a good motorcycle helmet then.

Maybe I am oversimplifying.

You are. What is pretty simple is the ability to design and manufacture some general, light duty helmets capable of at least some protection, at least at city speed limit levels. Change the levels of impact into those when the rider's machime is hit by a 50-ton semitrailer truck at combined speeds of 100mph or greater- which can be survivable- and a very different degree of stresses are involved.

In my accident in which a helmet did me some good, a construction worker's hardhat or military Kevlar K-Pot or MICH helmet likely would have sufficed. When a roadracer goes down on a course, or a racing hydroplane boat driver's boat lets go, it's a whole different story. And there WILL be those who want the very best they can get, based either on their experience, or just a desire for cutting-edge state-of-the-art equipment.

[hosepipe]

Going 80 miles an hour can kill you on a motorcycle even if your stopped..enclosed in an 18 wheeler with bubble wrap all around you...

[wjcsux]

I can't agree more. I used to race Motocross (too old & worn out for that now) and rode a Harley for a long time. I always wore my Bell Star full face helmet. If someone doesn't want to wear a helmet, fine. I will wear mine whenever I get on a bike.

[archy]

Compare Florida, a helmet state, with Iowa, a no-helmet state. Florida has a beautiful, year-round riding season.

Dated info. Florida's 25-year-old helmet law was declared unconstitutionally vague back in 1995. The result is as follows:

As of 12:01 AM on July 01, 2000, Florida became the 30th state to allow motorcyclists to ride without a helmet. However, the amendment to HB1911 is far from a repeal of the helmet law but rather a modification of s.316.211. HB1911 was signed into law by Governor Jeb Bush on June 16, 2000.

316.211 Equipment for motorcycle and moped riders.-- Effective July 1, 2000

(1) A person may not operate or ride upon a motorcycle unless the person is properly wearing protective headgear securely fastened upon his or her head which complies with Federal Motorcycle Vehicle Safety Standard 218 promulgated by the United States Department of Transportation. The Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles shall adopt this standard by agency rule.

(2) A person may not operate a motorcycle unless the person is wearing an eye-protective device over his or her eyes of a type approved by the department.

(3) (a) This section does not apply to persons riding within an enclosed cab or to any person 16 years of age or older who is operating or riding upon a motorcycle powered by a motor with a displacement of 50 cubic centimeters or less or is rated not in excess of 2 brake horsepower and which is not capable of propelling such motorcycle at a speed greater than 30 miles per hour on level ground.

(b) Notwithstanding subsection (1), a person over 21 years of age may operate or ride upon a motorcycle without wearing protective headgear securely fastened upon his or her head if such person is covered by an insurance policy providing for at least $10,000 in medical benefits for injuries incurred as a result of a crash while operating or riding on a motorcycle.

(4) A person under 16 years of age may not operate or ride upon a moped unless the person is properly wearing protective headgear securely fastened upon his or her head which complies with Federal Motorcycle Vehicle Safety Standard 218 promulgated by the United States Department of Transportation.

(5) The department shall make available a list of protective headgear approved in this section, and the list shall be provided on request.

(6) A violation of this section is a noncriminal traffic infraction, punishable as a nonmoving violation as provided in chapter 318.

[pizzalady]

***Just a couple weeks ago, I saw on the news a video clip where a woman said something to the effect of, "If it [whatever 'it' was] saves just one life, it really doesn't matter what it cost." ****

Isn't it laughable? Here we have the for and against "Helmet Law" forum.

Who's business should it be if I do or do not want to wear a helmet? In the absence of a law, people still have the right to act in their own self interest as they so choose.

In a country that was founded by men who believed in God and held the 10 Commandments in high esteem, we are now arguing the benefits of one of hundreds of thousands of laws.

In a country where "the few" have managed to have laws passed that prohibit the mention of God, the display of the Ten Commandments in public places, the reciting of the pledge of Allegiance. The mention of Christ in Christmas.

Instead of the few good common sense laws we started with, we are arguing because someone must now make our decisions for us to protect us.

I must be too old to understand. I've seen so many nonsense laws passed in my lifetime and I know that laws do not prevent crime. Gun laws don't prevent shootings. Helmet laws do not prevent death. So much that was not under any law is now illegal.

Legislation which attempts to protect us from endangering ourselves DOES NOT belong on the books.

I call them "IF ONLY" laws. If only there had been a law against............(fill in the blank).........than a life would have been saved. So let's pass a law so this will never happen again. !!! Well the law gets passed but it does not and can not prevent anything. It just makes it harder to try to stay within the law or to agree with the law.

Perhaps someone should research the possibility that crime has increased with the increase of laws on the books.

[archy]

Just a couple weeks ago, I saw on the news a video clip where a woman said something to the effect of, "If it [whatever 'it' was] saves just one life, it really doesn't matter what it cost."

No problem. It would save one life to take that woman and string her up from a utility pole, thence building a raging bonfire beneath her.

Indeed, it could save the many lives of those who may otherwise perish in the next national civil war, and who can profit by the example of the roasting bluenose pecksniff. Or several of the same sort.

-archy-/-

[Havoc]

You're right, they do not slide, in the largest percentage of circumstances they do one of three things, they grab asphault or concrete, they bounce, or they shatter. Speed and agle of attack are the biggest determinants - not the only ones; but, you are correct. I've only seen one accident where a helmet slid. You wouldn't want a description of it..

[Havoc]

Right. They are not designed to protect the neck - only the skull and it's contents. As I've heard stated by many others, a helmet is the difference between an open casket or a closed casket funeral showing in many cases. It may kill you; but, at least everyone can see the dead body and not cringe. Sign me up, 'eh. lol

[biblewonk]

Have a buddy who was out riding with friends and went down without a helmet - nearly died from head trauma. I also know of a professional rider who hit the pavement going only about 10 mph and was killed

Thousands of people fall and die every year in their houses. I'm simply not superstitious about safety equipment. There is no end to where that supersitition can take you. When it's my time to die there is nothing I can do to prevent it.

[-YYZ-]

"In general, I prefer to see the marketplace take care of such things. But that's kind of hard on those who think they're buying safety equipment, and are instead buying the very instrument of their own destruction."

OK, leaving aside the pro/con arguments for helmets' effectiveness for the moment, I agree with you. I'm still not convinced about the dangers of helmets relative to their benefits, although I've found the reading available at the site you gave a link to very interesting. While I may not buy all the arguments against helmets, it does seem pretty clear the the "public interest" argument in their favour is incorrect - the statistical difference in fatalities and serious injuries between those places with mandatory helmet laws and those without would appear to be tiny, at best.

Personally I choose to wear a very good helmet with Snell approval (A CDN$700 Shoei X-tec). I like full face because it keeps crap out of my face, and I know it'll save me some pain if I land on my face in a low-speed accident. I've never seen a full-face motorcycle helmet personally with anything like the high neckline of that pilot's helmet, but I've never really been looking for it, either. I'll certainly take that into consideration the next time I'm shopping for a helmet.

Cheers, Ry/YYZ

[Joe Hadenuf]

I dearly loved motorcycle riding and bikes of all kinds. But I sold my last one in the mid 80s. It was just sitting in the garage, waiting to kill me.

LOL, street bikes are death traps.

I've had three Harleys and a mess of other street bikes.

Gave them up some years ago. Too damn dangerous, to many close calls, especially in the bigger cities.

Now I still have some dirt bikes we ride in the high country and out in the high desert, but at least if you go down there, you generally just get scraped or bruised if that.

Go down on a street bike, and get ran over by five cars, after impacting concrete, curbs, or broadsided by 5000 pound cars. It's lights out quick.

Street bikes are just too damn dangerous for me.

After your busted up, turned into raw meat and dog food, the motorist will always say, " I just didn't see him officer"......

If others want to ride in the streets with fast moving 5,000 hammers, fine, just not me......

[gigo]

You're right, they do not slide, in the largest percentage of circumstances they do one of three things, they grab asphault or concrete, they bounce, or they shatter. Speed and agle of attack are the biggest determinants - not the only ones; but, you are correct. I've only seen one accident where a helmet slid. You wouldn't want a description of it..

oh baloney. No way are you going to convince me that a helmet has a lower coefficient of friction against asphalt than the typical hair and skin covered human head. I've crashed and landed directly on my forehead/face wearing a full faced Shoei RF700. It definitely slid. I wish I still had it so I could show y'all a picture. Thanks to that helmet, I still have my original equipment face. My dirt bike helmet slides great and has yet to shatter as I have tested it numerous times. Quit trying to twist phyisics to back your goofy and disengenuous helmets-will-hurt-you-in-a-getoff arguments. If you like not wearing a helmet for comfort, style and other reasons just say so. I understand and I back your right to go helmetless if you choose (as I do on rare occasions). But save the BS about helmets causing more damage than they prevent.

by the way how does one get on a "ping" list?