Do you live in a State that does NOT require a helmet? (red light, buy)
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the consistent numbers I have read and heard... someone who has taken a safety cource recently can chime in.
are about 30% of dead motorcyclists have alcohol in their system. and about 50% of dead motorcyclists have less than 3 years riding experience. http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwr...cid=mm6123a1_w
It is interesting in the above article I posted that they push on us in Florida. When they passed that people over 21 have a choice from helmet mandatory they cite that deaths skyrocketed the next year. But if you go to the florida actual data that the CDC article does not tell you to do. The number of riders went up significantly by removing the mandatory helmet law. they said this did not correlate to the number of accidents... I say bullshiiiite. And as we know adding a huge number of new inexperienced riders will cause many more skewed accidents and deaths. Yet the document writer did not discuss this issue or normalize it in the data. Thus I claim theoir so called research is garbage and should be removed from the public. A second one I found that also shows the credibility of the paper is in question is they found that the number of deaths of the under 21 riders with mandatory helmets the death rate jumped huge, about 300% of helmeted riders....
now here is a very interested fact I found. With 50% of the riders on each side, we can guesstimate that the two years the percentafge should not have changed. But in 2010 63 pecent of the dead motorcyclists were wearing helmets, thus data showing a motorcycle helmet that definitively says wearing a helmet is more deadly during that year... Florida
Quote:
In 2011, helmet use in Florida was observed at 49.3 percent.
Quote:
37 percent of motorcyclists were not wearing a safety helmet before a fatal crash during 2010.
also interesting in florida even though they have a mandatory helmet law for under 21, the death rate went up by 3 times for that age group.
Quote:
During 2008–2010, a total of 14,283 motorcyclists were killed in crashes, among whom 6,057 (42%) were not wearing a helmet
again that means in this case 58% of the deaths on motorcycle were wearing helmets.
also I find this below very troubling... at least they mentioned doing this, but what the F? because the data did not fit their goals they threw it out?
Quote:
Percentages were suppressed for states with fewer than 10 fatalities involving motorcyclists who were not wearing helmets.
I don't pay much attention to the stats on helmets vrs no helmet. The reason is that both sides try to grab stats.
A guy can be wearing a helmet and have a minor fender bender. Traffic report says rider was wearing a helmet. The stats people will grab that for their stats and say, "Because of the helmet, he lived." When in fact, he wasn't injured at all.
Same goes for a person with no helmet. I would venture a guess and say that most motorcycle accidents where there is a fatality, the rider would have died, helmet or no helmet, but the stats folks will grab that stat and say, the fatality is because he wasn't wearing a helmet.
I live in Wyoming and there is no helmet requirements for adults. There is helmet requirements for minors.
My primary transportation is a 4 wheeler. In Wyoming we license them, insure them and can ride anywhere but the interstate. Highways, streets, are ok. I live 20 miles from town and use my 4 wheeler to run back and forth. Matter of fact, I just rode into town and back today. I put more miles on my 4 wheeler each year, than I do my Ford truck.
I do not wear a helmet.
When I was in the Navy and stationed in San Diego, I rode a motorcycle to work. There, I had to wear a helmet because of Navy Regs. Can't get on base unless you have full face helmet, long pants, shoes with heels, full fingered gloves and a orange vest. Wearing a helmet didn't bother me, and matter of fact, made me feel a lot safer in all that traffic. A little different than the trip to town today when I met no vehicles when I went to town and on the way back I only met 2 vehicles.
I don't pay much attention to the stats on helmets vrs no helmet. The reason is that both sides try to grab stats.
A guy can be wearing a helmet and have a minor fender bender. Traffic report says rider was wearing a helmet. The stats people will grab that for their stats and say, "Because of the helmet, he lived." When in fact, he wasn't injured at all.
Same goes for a person with no helmet.
Just another way of describing the old saying of:
There are 3 kinds of lies. Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics
A competent (not even good) statistician can tell you anything they desire and have "stats" prove what they want. It's all in picking and choosing the reports you want to tell the correct story for your particular interest.
Helmet laws are what they are, mostly a diversion from bigger issues. But that's a political slant I'm not interested in polluting a motorcycle forum with. Helmet use is personal. 22 years after taking my very first ride and I've gone without maybe 2 or 3 times, mostly to see what it was like. For me, it sucks. I can't imagine Wanting to be wind-burned, sun-burned, pelted by bugs, rocks, dust, being forced to stop riding because of rain/snow/sleet. I've been a year round, all weather, all occasion rider for a long time (went MC only for 8 years) and average 15k/year. The fact that I've destroyed a couple helmets in crashes (one street, several road-racing) and am still here without sustaining notable injury is proof enough, for me, that they do their job.
The only time I care if someone else is wearing a helmet (and other gear), is if they want to ride with me. I've been through a few situations where others riding with me have a crash, and I don't particularly enjoy seeing anyone dead or in pain/all bloody. The last time it happened, thankfully we were out of any sort of cell range so I volunteered to go call for help. It's just not a situation I enjoy, so I won't ride with people who don't/wont wear gear. I get to sleep better at night that way.
Brian_M, , yes one can get the stats to say what you want, and that is why we also have people that can counter the stats from the other side. In the scientific community stats got us to the moon. If stats can do that it is just finding out which are the most critical. The DOT has a pre-disposition to force helmets on all. So it is up to those of us who do not believe their positions to counter their slant as I have done here.
And in this debate, this thread is long but I have shown that helmets by their own research increase your possibility to an accident. Again it many states it is illegal to drive with a helmet on in a car in street settings. Obstruction of view. anyone who would argue that adding 50% more weight and absolute decreasing the view is just a nonobjective idiot. I have also given a real world example of the physics of the array processing of distortion in sound triangulation if you are wearing full face helmets. This is one they are not aware of, but because I am hearing impaired and an engineer I was able to figure out. There is a professor that understand this principle and is making a next generation hearing device using array processing at Stanford University. I was going to apply for a patent on this technology to help hard of hearing people in loud locations like restaurants. But the beauty of the internet is I found he was working on it so I did not continue my efforts. I promise you barely any ear doctors would have a clue about phase shifting array processing. This professor at Stanford has won some of the most distinguished awards for him being the first to discover it. He would not know about the helmet issue.
So anyway we have a second physical constraint that also makes these helmets less safe in the terms of an accident prevention. Now there is a entirely different analysis if you are in a accident. I agree in an accident having a helmet does decrease your probability to dying, the stats in general overwhelmingly support that. But DOT argues there is a major cost saying a dead person cost us over a million dollars in their argument. From what I have found out when asking my friends that are emergency room doctors a dead person does not have any costs at the hospital. And the hospital costs are the major cost.
The only research the DOT has paid for in determining are helmets likely to hamper you view and so on has been buried and the conclusions they came to are ridiculous. I found it just a year ago and it found that a significant number of people once they put helmets on did not even turn their head anymore when changing lanes.
This is just human factors, and it found the angle they turned ones head in the overall was reduced just a bit/negligible in some but a lot in others. No one can reasonably say that you are safer when you are not checking and even checking less of an angle certainly does not make you safer. Again that is just human factors as we call it in engineering, no training can overcome that, it is a physical constraint/trade off. . And they have never funded another project like that since that project, why my guess is it is definitely not going to back mandatory helmet use.
again this explains why since I was writing my first paper challenging helmets way back in college there has not been one single year that the helmet mandatory states have ever had less accidents than helmet optional states. And I have asked the DOT for the concrete data of all the aggregate years because I did get the ear of my state representative who was chair of the DOT of my state.
I give her credit she did dialog with me and she did change from being hard core no way to I will not oppose it going to committee. She had the power and used it to stop it from even going to committee because a friend of hers son died on a motorcycle. I was able to discuss it with her via the internet, and as I said I give her credit she did dialog, I may not have changed her mind. I have good enough credentials for being at least listened too as a engineer who has been VP of engineering, director of R&D of a bay area tech company, and many patents and even one in the transportation area. So she asked me for specifics, and I then went to DOT and asked them for the specific information I wanted as it is easy if you have the data, and they would not give it to me, and all they would do is give the data on if you are in an accident it saves lives. I repeated told them I wanted the data on accident rates of helmet mandatory vs optional. And finally told them why and they would not do it for me at the request of my states head of the DOT. So the fed DOT knows this is information that is detrimental to their position. I have done this calculation several times over the last 30 years and never found an exception but I wanted all the years for the past 40 years of records. That would speak much louder. But because the federal DOT was not co-operative, I argued to her which is a good argument, if the data ever showed that states with mandatory helmet laws had less accidents the feds would be all over it and pushing it in our faces like they do with the death with and without data. But in my 30 years plus of of listening the propaganda of the DOT not once have they ever posted such info. And I have asked them so they can not act like it is some kind of enlightening idea.
Because my ultimate point is the federal government does not have a right to increase my likelihood of harming myself. I have no problem with people assume that risk for themselves, people skydive, dive , Kite all the time. But to force everyone to jump out of a plane is not acceptable. The only place I know the government does force you to an increase in likelihood of injury death is mandatory military and right now it is voluntary so you accept the risk. No place else do I know of a plce government forces you to a higher risk of bodily harm.
here is some more information data. should it be held against us with licenses for these who do not have licenses?
also in this report deaths have gone down significantly. from 2000 to 2009 during the period where many states went helmet optional.
Twenty-two percent of motorcycle riders involved in fatal crashes in 2009 were
riding their vehicles without a valid motorcycle license at the time of the collision,
while only 12 percent of drivers of passenger vehicles in fatal crashes did not have
valid licenses.
Quote:
Alcohol
In fatal crashes in 2009 a higher percentage of motorcycle riders had blood alcohol
concentration (BAC) of .08 grams per deciliter (g/dL) or higher than any other type
of motor vehicle driver. The percentages for operators involved in fatal crashes
were 29 percent for motorcycles, 23 percent for passenger cars, 23 percent for light
trucks, and 2 percent for large trucks.
motorcycles did not change significantly; 11.6 deaths per 10,000 motorcycles prelaw, and 12.5 deaths postlaw.
CONCLUSIONS:
There was a significant rise in motorcycle fatalities after Florida's helmet law repeal, which appears to be associated with an increase in the number of motorcycle riders. Injury prevention efforts focusing on factors other than helmet use should be developed in light of continuing repeal of universal motorcycle helmet laws across the nation.
PMID: 17993943 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
here is an interesting one... a major study for 3 years of data. and helmeted people had the same rate of requiring treatment in hospitals.
In the data set, 57 percent of motorcyclists were helmeted at the time of the crashes and 43 percent were non-helmeted. For both groups, about 40 percent of motorcyclists were treated at hospitals or died following the crashes.
Quote:
(1) that hospital charges for motorcyclists who were unhelmeted were on average 8 percent higher than for those who were helmeted;
Invintor1, it's good you believe strongly in something (not exactly common anymore), but I suspect that you have an agenda to believe what you want to believe. That's fine, it takes all kinds to make this world interesting. Just don't expect to get much in the way of thoughtful debate based on your stance. You're going to find "followers" and the rest of us and only rarely does that line get crossed once someone has made their mind up.
Heh, ever try to talk to a pro-lifer about the benefits of abortion? How about anti-capital punishment to those who feel it's good for humanity? Helmet laws aren't quite as emotional, but fits in the same slot.
I'm certainly not going to change your well-entrenched opinion, so why bother pointing out the inexact claims in some of your arguments? You're not going to believe it anyway. You've failed to "prove" or "show" anything, by the way.
Anyway, I see that this thread is now about personal agenda. I'm not down with that, so time for me to stop reading/posting in here.
Most dont wear helmets to look cool on the bike, it just makes you look ignorant without one.You will or should get over that once you grow up. I've seen guys get hurt just riding around the yard and have a slight fall off the bike and get hurt. You go boy, dont wear one.
Most dont wear helmets to look cool on the bike, it just makes you look ignorant without one.You will or should get over that once you grow up. I've seen guys get hurt just riding around the yard and have a slight fall off the bike and get hurt. You go boy, dont wear one.
how old are you? I agree that could be the younger ones. I thought those with full leathers and real nice fancy full face helmets and the superbikes were the ones who thought they were cool. And I think they are to a degree. Unfortunately the fatality stats, about 30% of them are the death stats. And I have no problem with them going the way they wanted... As long as they are not hurting someone else... let them be.
as far as people riding in their yards... Off road riding is much more hazardous for "accidents" from what I have seen, but not nearly as deadly as the road. I see people fall off dirt riding almost always, that's why they ride with full gear. apples to oranges.
Invintor1, it's good you believe strongly in something (not exactly common anymore), but I suspect that you have an agenda to believe what you want to believe. That's fine, it takes all kinds to make this world interesting. Just don't expect to get much in the way of thoughtful debate based on your stance. You're going to find "followers" and the rest of us and only rarely does that line get crossed once someone has made their mind up.
Heh, ever try to talk to a pro-lifer about the benefits of abortion? How about anti-capital punishment to those who feel it's good for humanity? Helmet laws aren't quite as emotional, but fits in the same slot.
I'm certainly not going to change your well-entrenched opinion, so why bother pointing out the inexact claims in some of your arguments? You're not going to believe it anyway. You've failed to "prove" or "show" anything, by the way.
Anyway, I see that this thread is now about personal agenda. I'm not down with that, so time for me to stop reading/posting in here.
Did you read the entire thread to show you anything, hard to show someone when they did not read it all, but I would not read the entire thread either unless I was as interested in it as I am.
I think your missing something here, I read your position and side all the time, that is the stuff DOT publishes. Do you have more to their well written, well documented, and widely published side of the argument than what they put forward for the last 30 years? Most people just throw in anecdotal information that has nothing to do with facts and statistics. We did not get to the moon with anecdotal information, we did by the information format that the DOT is putting out. But the difference is there was the other side put forward in the debate to get to the moon.
FYI I also dialoged to a lessor degree with my US House representative in the middle 90s who was a sponsor of the DOT bill to force states to make helmets mandatory as a rider. that week I had my letter mainly asking her since I had those qualifications and I follow the debate and to date I had not seen the data I asked for from the DOT. I asked her for the information she specifically had that showed helmets did not cause accidents. again with my data and so on. Also volunteering to give her a full face helmet for a month and let her drive a car with it. Again she was a main sponsor, I have no idea for sure but the shortly there after she withdrew her support for that bill as a sponsor. So I have no concrete evidence in this case but I believe I did influence her, so your point that this is not a button issue like abortion I think is accurate. Though I have moved from Evanston, IL a long time ago she is still that congressperson for that district and I am proud of her. And like I said I had back and forth email dialog with the Nevada state representative who was the chair of the transportation for the state. She too did for the first time allow the measure come to committee. I may not have changed her mind but opened it to debate where she concluded it should not be her decision only. Again I think she too is a great example of great elected people... and this is not at the level of abortion issues.
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