This is the OP. I'm a woman. I guess if you're an avid cyclist everyone assumes you're a man?<p>The article is the reason why I'm done wearing a helmet. I write my blog as a way to expose different viewpoints around cycling. I feel comfortable with this decision and will no longer be wearing a helmet. If they're not completely scientifically sound in your judgement, fine, keep wearing a helmet. I tried to use the data to the best of my ability, as I have a master's degree in public health. But then again, this blog is not for an academic audience, so I try not to make it too heavy.<p>The arguments I posted are those that have swayed me. What it comes down to is this: I believe biking is an inherently safe activity, on par with driving a car and walking. When I'm biking 12-14mph on bike paths and trails, as part of my daily regular activities, I feel there is no need to wear a helmet.
The guy sounds insane. Simple physics indicates that the longer the collision the less force applied will be.<p>The only reason that the individual states that wearing a helmet is a hinderence is:<p>1. You don't look as fashionable (the words are "less human")<p>2. Drivers see you more as a human when you're not wearing one.<p>I would venture to say that if a driver notices you not wearing a helmet, the assumption is that the biker is an idiot and they would be more cautious around them. (No one really wants to hit a biker) Additionally this doesn't really fix the problem. Many bikers get into an incident with cars for reasons such as:<p>1. The biker was not seen by the driver until it was too late. (Lack of awareness/being used to them on the road)<p>2. Biker cutting off the driver<p>3. Road rage (on the car's side): It happens but I would suggest it less common than claimed.<p>4. Biker not following the rules of the road. (Biking up the wrong way, ignoring stoplights/stopsigns etc)
We need some HN readers from the Netherlands to chime in here.<p>"Although the Netherlands is probably the safest country in the world for cycling, helmet wearing among Dutch cyclists is rare. It has been estimated that only about 0.5 percent of cyclists in the Netherlands are helmeted"<p><i>Why are Dutch cyclists more likely to be injured if they wear helmets?</i> - <a href="http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1261.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1261.html</a>
Some of this reasoning doesn't make much sense when making a personal decision.<p>"Helmet use may deter people from cycling", that doesn't affect whether or not you should wear one.<p>"Benefits of biking out way the risks", you don't lose the benefits if you cycle with a helmet.
A common misconception is that bicycle helmets protect you in a serious crash. They don't: if you get hit going 30 mph, anything less than a motorcycle helmet isn't going to help you much. But most bike crashes aren't serious; they're minor, low-speed crashes where the rider is knocked from the bicycle or bumped just hard enough to lose balance. Because the center of gravity on a bicycle is high, it's easy to hit your head in these types of crashes -- hard.<p>Those are the crashes that bike helmets are designed for. Let's say you were waiting at a light, and the light just changed. A car mirror clips you just as you're pushing off and getting your balance, you fall over and hit your head on a curb. If you have a helmet on, you walk away with a headache and maybe a skinned elbow. Without a helmet on, you crack your head open and potentially die.
>But helmets are not supposed to shatter. When a helmet protects your head from a serious injury, the styrofoam inside will be compressed and stay that way<p>Is this correct? It sounds very wrong to me. I got the impression that shattering is a great way to redirect kinetic energy away from your head
Absolutely, this is why I rarely/never wear a helmet. People think of them as essential safety gear in case you get hit by a car, but they offer almost no protection against this risk. They are designed to protect your head if you spontaneously fall off a stationary bicycle. In good weather, at low speeds, on flat, clean roads, these accidents will be very rare for competent cyclists.<p>Cycling is simply a safe, fun means of travel. And you don't need special protective gear unless you're doing something weird.<p>Children? Mountain bikers? People cycling in snow or mud? People doing tricks or trying to show off to girls? Yea, they should probably wear a helmet.<p>A friend of mine once compared ordinary commuting in a helmet to wearing a condom all day: it's useful if you're doing something risky, but otherwise it's just uncomfortable.<p>Helmets are uncomfortable and goofy, and I probably would ride less on the bike if I had to wear one all the time, as with a mandatory helmet law. The exercise benefits of regular cycling outweigh the marginal risk of head injury.<p>By the same logic of the helmet-shamers, we should shame motorists and pedestrians for not wearing a helmet for routine travel. But nobody seems to take that idea seriously for some reason.<p>More important safety equipment than helmets: bike lights, mirrors, bells, basic repair gear, and fenders.
Some bits in here make me seriously question the author's judegment.<p>"Many more motorists and pedestrians die in traffic collisions per year than do bicyclists. We don’t see them wearing helmets."<p>Doesn't this support the opposite argument of what the author is claiming? Further, I would expect as much anyway simply because so many fewer people bike than motorcycle or drive a car.<p>"If not wanting to wear a helmet deters someone from riding a bike, that sucks, because biking is healthy and awesome."<p>This is a silly argument. It could just as easily be said, "If wearing a helmet deters someone from riding a bike, that sucks, because wearing a helmet protects your head."<p>"I don’t want to hide my head behind a helmet, I want drivers to pass me on the street and see that I am a person, a human, just like them."<p>Nobody said that wearing a helmet was supposed to make a person more attractive. Would the author universally agree to "I don't wear protective gear $x because I want people to see that I'm a human being?" Probably not.<p>Ultimately, I don't think anybody can argue that having a protective shell around your head is somehow less safe or equally safe to having nothing there at all.
> People will so often put up photos on social media of obliterated helmets and say, “Holy crap, look at my helmet! It saved my life!” But helmets are not supposed to shatter. When a helmet protects your head from a serious injury, the styrofoam inside will be compressed and stay that way. Most of the pictures I’ve seen are of helmets that have broken apart.<p>Just.. what?<p>Any sort of mechanical deformation is essentially an energy release. Be it compression, cracking or what else. The energy that went to cracking the polycarbonate shell is the energy that didn't reach your skull.
Pretty much my sentiments. I've been cycling for over 40 years and have gone from never wearing one, to always wearing one, to seldom wearing one.
This is pretty dumb and naive, and loaded with non-sequiturs and other obvious fallacies. Like this gem:<p>>"Many more motorists and pedestrians die in traffic collisions per year than do bicyclists. We don’t see them wearing helmets."<p>Hey. Maybe if they <i>did</i> wear helmets, fewer of them would die. Ever think of that?
This seems like a serious case of Black Swan reasoning. In other words, she seems to be taking an apparent lack of evidence that helmets prevent injury as evidence that helmets don't prevent injury. Just remember, you wear a helmet 99.9% of the time for no reason to prevent serious injury on that 0.1% incident because that's all it takes. We all know that slamming your head on pavement is bad and having a shell to protect your head is preferable to not having one. She seems to be assuming that because nothing bad has happened to her yet that she is safe with no helmet.<p>Put differently- I wonder if you told the author a brick was going to fall on her head and then asked given the option to wear a helmet or not wear one which she would pick.
I used to ride without a helmet too. I though I'd as soon get directly killed than get a brain injury. But then you do get a brain injury and not get killed and your life turns into hell, especially if your brain is the one thing you've always depended on the most. I recommend paying a visit to <a href="http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/forum92.html" rel="nofollow">http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/forum92.html</a> to catch a glimpse how splendidly well (where's my sarcasm sign?) people with brain injuries have been doing. I didn't get mine from a bike accident (collapsed scaffolding), but it's been a constant source of joy for the whole last year and I still have some minor issues to deal with (and that was a mild one as far as brain injuries go). I always wear a helmet on larger bike trips now. Anything that mitigates or reduces the chances of a brain injury is very much worth it. If you want to take reckless risks, at least don't write idiotic blog posts about it.
I'm most likely alive right now because of a helmet. Long story short, I had a crash that resulted in me whipping the back of my head into the ground. I ended up with a very bad concussion, an iffy memory for a couple of months, and a destroyed helmet. I'll keep wearing a helmet.
Many safety standards have surprisingly little science behind them. That is not always a bad thing. Trial and error can work if there is the possibility of changing the design. Once the body of experience is codified into a standard then development stops.<p>The current bike helmet standards are a good example of what happens in the absence of both good theory and experience. We have a design that prevents an injury that almost never happens (skull fracture) and that fails to protect against a common injury (concussion). The current standards make it impossible to improve things much but there are people out there that are trying:<p><a href="http://www.helmets.org/liners.htm#cone-head" rel="nofollow">http://www.helmets.org/liners.htm#cone-head</a>
It seems that people missed the fact that the article has plenty of links supporting his claims. Unfortunately the link colour is almost the same as the text colour.<p>One of the most compelling studies is from New Zealand [1]:
"The New Zealand Medical Journal published Evaluation of New Zealand's bicycle helmet law ... showing a massive plunge in cycling levels and a 20% higher accident rate since helmet law enforcement."<p>Also, there was a study showing that cyclists with helmets receive less space from passing cars than those without.<p>[1] <a href="http://www.cycle-helmets.com/zealand_helmets.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.cycle-helmets.com/zealand_helmets.html</a>
Here's a 2013 Australian study: "The effectiveness of helmets in bicycle collisions with motor vehicles: A case–control study": <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0001457513000183" rel="nofollow">http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0001457513...</a><p>"Helmet use was associated with reduced risk of head injury in bicycle collisions with motor vehicles of up to 74%, and the more severe the injury considered, the greater the reduction."<p>Is there some reason to doubt this?
Minneapolis is arguably the best city in the US for bicycling (in competition with Portland). That said, biking here can be incredibly dangerous, and cyclists are killed every year. The streets and intersections around town have numerous "ghost bikes", white bicycles locked in places where a cyclist was killed by a car.<p>The author's point doesn't stand to reason. First, not all injuries are created equal. Head injuries are more likely to kill or permanently impair a cyclist than any other injury. Second, regardless of the results of studies and confirmation bias, it's obvious that helmets <i>do</i> absorb a great deal of impact - impact that can kill or permanently injure you.<p>Beyond that, though, helmets aren't the #1 thing that can be done to protect cyclists. Improving car drivers is the #1 thing. Malicious drivers who openly hate cyclists aren't the worst - neglectful ones are. You know, the ones who turn right in front of a bicycle, or lane change into a bicycle. They don't know the cyclist is there. Often, they don't know how close they came to killing someone, as they text away obliviously.<p>The next thing that can be done is better urban planning, with bicycle-friendly streets. That doesn't mean sidewalk "bike lanes" that are 10mph and shared with moms pushing strollers. That means relatively safe road design where bicyclists can either integrate into the traffic flow or be around it with less danger. These designs are often flawed, though, built mostly to keep bicycles from inconveniencing cars rather than keeping cyclists safe (the "bike lanes" of downtown Minneapolis, which completely hide cyclists from cars turning in front of them, are the ultimate example).<p>At any rate, the article is quite wrong.
I've had my share of accidents riding my bike, and in none of them would a helmet have helped anything. So much for anecdotal confirmation.<p>There are certainly conditions that make the use of a helmet advisable, but that depends on the situation. Anything more than that is just the result of lobbying & PR by the helmet-making industry.
Bicycle helmets are worthless, as well as equestrian half helmets. How often in a bike wreck do you hit the exact top of your head vs the sides, your chin, your face, or the back of your neck?<p>The only type of helmet that can actually prevent injury is a full face motorcycle helmet with solid chinbar.
As for me, my main reason not to wear a helmet is that it limits my field of vision and an ability to hear (including low frequencies) to such an extent that I feel blindfolded. I cannot tolerate even a hat for the same reason.
The article doesn't say from which part of the world it is (though clearly outside Europe), but where it's from matters a lot.<p>Dutch media, for example, do not focus on helmet use at all, because it's a non-issue. Well, mostly. Almost nobody here wears a helmet (though increasing numbers of children do), simply because it's not necessary.<p>Then again, Dutch traffic is designed with cyclists in mind. In other countries, that's not the case. You need to know what your local cycling situation is, and whether that does or doesn't require a helmet.
Should have focused on data and studies relating to the idea that most crashes involved with people wearing non-full-face helmets do not result in helmets saving their head from serious injury.
I'm sorry but this post mentions there isn't any good data and then dives into anecdotes.<p>"But helmets are not supposed to shatter." Yes, they are. After any crash with a helmet you're support to discard it and purchase a new one. It absorbed, hopefully, the vast majority of the energy of the impact, not your skull.<p>"Cyclists don’t die from just falling off their bikes, they die because they are hit by cars."<p>Doubtless, but this is one of the few cases in which there are statistics available because it involves motor vehicles... and death.<p>"Learning safe riding skills, being visible, and being attentive are the things we all can do to prevent an accident."<p>Yes, absolutely. Ride defensively and assume NO ONE can see you and knows where you are at ALL times even and sometimes especially in a bike lane.<p>"I replaced my road bike’s drop handlebars with swept back bars, for a more upright riding position"<p>The observation of mountain/flat bars being a better city / casual riding position is true. But you don't need to ditch your drops if you ride on the tops when appropriate. Many people have a second pair of brake levers accessible from the tops as well as their integrated levers at the hoods.<p>What I'm most surprised about is that the author doesn't mention a study where drivers on average, apparently, drive 3 inches closer to cyclists WITH helmets on because they perceive them to be protected.<p>All this said: WEAR A HELMET. I'll provide an anecdote: the wheel coming off of a front fork after someone tried to steal their wheel earlier in the day (unlocking the quick release). I found the man with his face smashed on the ground, his left eye caved in on the Manhattan Bridge.<p>Route 9W, bottom of the first major hill, debris collected from over winter. Many cyclists repairing flats, another one who got taken away in an ambulance, helmet shattered and knee "destroyed". He would have certainly died if he had not been wearing a helmet.<p>The point is saying that helmets don't protect you from crashes is like saying seatbelts don't protect you from crashes. Yes! It's true, but they protect you from hurting yourself too badly if and when you DO crash.
I stopped reading when the author said a shattered helmet didn't protect from a head injury.<p>You're telling the same forces that shattered the helmet wouldn't have damaged the head?<p>Nonsense.
This is like saying "Im done wearing a bullet proof vest as it only prevents certain types of gunshot wounds, is uncomfortable to wear and not fashionable."
I agree with most of these points, however, anecdotally I will say that my helmet prevented some pretty nasty facial road rash when I was doored a few years ago. I tipped and hit my head, and then slid ~10 feet. My helmet prevented my face/ear from taking the initial impact as well as the subsequent slide across the dirty urban asphalt.<p>Helmets don't just protect from massive TBIs.
Here's some data: <a href="http://www.iihs.org/iihs/topics/t/pedestrians-and-bicyclists/fatalityfacts/bicycles" rel="nofollow">http://www.iihs.org/iihs/topics/t/pedestrians-and-bicyclists...</a><p>Also, the link in the article about health benefits doesn't point to anything on the web.
He doesn't make very strong arguments ("the numbers are hard to get, I don't have any"). In my mind I see myself falling to the ground and smashing my head on the ground. I'd like to avoid that if possible. Is he saying thinner/better helmets are needed to avoid neck injuries?
This guy should not be a health professional.<p>"But helmets are not supposed to shatter" - not true. Many bike helmets are designed to shatter on impact, that's how they absorb the energy.<p><a href="http://www.bhsi.org/standard.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.bhsi.org/standard.htm</a>
Where I live there is a bridge over the river which has a multi-use trail (basically, a shared bike/walk/rollerblade/whatever path) on both sides of it. This trail is separated from the traffic on the bridge by a railing and large girders. The bridge was built to carry rail traffic on the top deck and car traffic below.<p>On the south end of the bridge, the road and multi-use trails jog eastward and up a slope, while the rail portion of the bridge continues south towards a tunnel. This results in a spot on one of the trails where there are low-hanging girders. If you are walking, these are fine, if you are biking these are very dangerous and cyclists who weren't wearing helmets have been killed by failing to duck. Since the impact was directly to the head, these deaths would have likely been prevented by a helmet. Cyclists who veer too far towards the girders alongside the trail have also been killed, again an impact directly to the head where a helmet would help.
Here is the article for those who can't access the page (Database Error)<p><a href="https://www.anony.ws/i/2015/06/15/helmet.png" rel="nofollow">https://www.anony.ws/i/2015/06/15/helmet.png</a><p>(Click image to zoom)
This might be useful for my main gripe, which is the sweating:<p><a href="http://www.hovding.com/videos" rel="nofollow">http://www.hovding.com/videos</a><p>It's a helmet/airbag. Looks pretty cool, but I've never met anyone who had one.
Do you have any information that shows the effectiveness of helmet use in crashes that don't involve cars? I've read that approximately half of all bike crashes do not involve cars. [ looking for a citation ]
This is why people should not wear seat belt, or be required to have driver license.<p>It deters more people from driving a car and it communicates that driving car is a dangerous activity and require protective gear and license.
That is great, evolution always find its ways to get rid off the weaker population. Wearing a helmet (a good one) can save your life.<p>Some details:<p>"Is there evidence that helmets protect brains and heads? We have a statistics page that may help you research that. Don't miss the recent New York City data showing that 97% of their dead cyclists had no helmet."<p>I know what a data scientist would say, correlation is not causation.<p>More details, lots os studies and numbers here: <a href="http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm</a><p>A good video in the subject:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=CLbpXkSoM2A" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=CLbpXkSoM2A</a>
The helmet is no more a hindrance than a seatbelt. If you choose not to wear a helmet so be it, you are an adult. But don't expect me to pay for your medical bills if you have a head injury while cycling and you were not wearing helmet.<p>I also have to wonder if the increased neck injuries cited go back to when helmets were not designed to skid when impacting the ground.
This article is completely crazy.<p>I'd 100% prefer safety over fashion any day of the week. Have you been in a car crash? Thank god for seat belts!
I completely disagree with this article. Yes, helmets may increase the risk of other injuries (not inclusive of "I am hearing a helmet, I am a invincible" injuries), but the benefit of reduced head injury vastly outweigh the increase in other injuries.<p>On another note, there has been quite a bit of development into helmets in the last 5 or so years. Check out MIPS system [1]. It basically allows the head to move independently of the helmet increasing the "time" of the impact and also reducing oblique forces on the brain. Does it 100% work? Who knows. Is my head priceless, yes.<p>[1] <a href="http://www.mipshelmet.com/#what-is-mips" rel="nofollow">http://www.mipshelmet.com/#what-is-mips</a> (fyi, slow website)