Riding a Bicycle with a Helmet: A Healthy Trend
It may not seem like the coolest way to ride a bicycle for many teens throughout the country, but wearing a helmet is certainly the safest. In an ideal world coolness would be determined by an adherence to that which is safe, however in a world where ‘bad’ means ‘good’, it is sadly cooler to live life dangerously.
How Dangerous is Cycling Without a Helmet?
Now most observers will argue against whether riding a bicycle without a helmet is really living life dangerously. Well, most people live life without ever being injured in a serious car crash, and most people will never experience a severe bicycle injury. However, just as car seats are installed in vehicles to protect the minority that are unfortunate enough to be involved in something as tragic as a severe car accident, helmets should be considered more of a moral obligation for cyclers.
Stating the Obvious
Of course, the logic behind wearing helmets is to avoid any brain injuries. Our brains are very delicate organs and the outer shell of the skull is likewise very vulnerable to damage. Forgive me for stating the obvious, but the hardness of concrete can injure both your skull and brain.
In fact, more than driving without a seatbelt on, cycling without a helmet can very easily cause a serious head injury claim experts.
And yet, the ignorance towards needing to wear helmets is so prevalent that Labour MP David Miliband – on a visit to a primary school – felt it necessary to highlight the dangers of not wearing helmets while cycling, as if the parents of the addressed kids hadn’t already done so.
Are Parents Doing Enough?
Perhaps then this is where the problem lies. Parents aren’t educating their children over the dangers of not wearing a helmet. One subsequently has to wonder why this is the case, and the most probable answer will simply have to be that parents themselves aren’t passionate enough about the need for their kids to wear helmets.
Turning Safety into the Trend
The overall heart of the problem lies in a lack of education amongst parents. Such education unfortunately – due to our short attention spans – needs to be in the form of an extensive campaign against cycling without a helmet on. This will likely take years to implement efficiently and we may well not see any noticeable results until a decade has passed. However, just as smoking is slowly starting to lose its glamour, cycling while wearing helmets can be another area where our health and safety becomes the trend.
Tahar Rajab