Fewer helmets, more rests 1803

What causes a head injury? There are many causes of head injury in children and adults. The most common injuries are from motor vehicle accidents (where the person is either riding as a pbuttenger in the car or is struck as a pedestrian), from violence, from falls, or as a result of child abuse.

(For children, properly installed car seats of the correct size for the child, prevent many of these injuries and note, many of the head injuries in car accidents are to those who are hit, but are pedestrians or on bicycles or motorcycles, the injuries are counted in both sets of statistics).

Data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration demonstrates that airbags saved the lives of nearly 13,000 people. Other studies show that front-impact airbags, combined with a seat belt can prevent 85% of serious head injuries.

Side airbags will prevent more as well.

(Side issue: Preventing anyone from driving using alcohol or drugs could probably prevent more of this. US culture doesn't have enough guts to get tough on drunk drivers by keeping them from ever getting a license again once convicted of driving drunk. The accident rate in countries like Switzerland and Sweden where there is much alcohol use, but almost no drunk driving ought to tell us in the US that we are doing something wrong in these cases)

# More than 80 percent of all motorcycle crashes result in injury or rest to the motorcyclist.

# Per mile driven, a motorcyclist is 16 times more likely to die in a crash than an automobile driver. Wearing a motorcycle helmet reduces that risk by almost one-third (29 percent).

# Head injury is a leading cause of rest in motor cycle crashes. Riders who donât wear helmets and who experience a crash are 40 percent more likely to sustain a bane head injury.

# A study of 900 motorcycle crashes (conducted by the University of Southern California) showed that wearing a helmet was the single most critical factor in preventing or reducing head and neck injuries among motorcycle drivers and pbuttengers.

# From 1984 through 1995, helmets saved the lives of more than 7,400 motorcyclists. But more than 6,300 additional rests could have been prevented if all riders had been wearing helmets.

# Studies show that laws requiring helmet use are very effective in reducing motorcycle baneities because such laws influence more people to wear helmets. In Louisiana, the first state to repeal and then re-adopt a helmet law for all riders, there were 30 percent fewer motorcycle rests during 1982, the first year that the helmet law was reinstated.

-- Dorothy

There is no sound, no cry in all the world that can be heard unless someone listens ..

The Outer Limits