Health Report letter

4 views

Skip to first unread message

Bruce dreaming

unread,

May 24, 2017, 1:42:06 AM5/24/17

to Freestyle Cyclists Australia and New Zealand

Dear Norman Swan:

I have listened intently to your: Is it time for a sugar tax discussion and then read the transcript.

I found it very interesting.

I am a very interested in the science of this debate especially in this quote

“Rob Moodie: So that's why it is actually important to be very specific about what the tax is, what the expected impacts are and that we can actually measure them. And even then with good evidence it's how we can actually explain the evidence back to the political decision makers and to the community, because often it will be completely distorted by vested interests. I mean, that's their job. Their job is to make money out of their products, and they will fight for their right to do so.”

It sounds like Rob Moodie has been involved in the road trauma field.

My interest is in exactly this same field with the ongoing debate about Mandatory Helmet Legislation MHL, I am sure yourself and Rob would hold an opinion on this.

I will assume for this letter that cycling helmets are 100% efficient at eliminating all head injuries going by Vic Crash Stats that would save around 20% of all hospital deaths. As this is one fifth of all cycling deaths it seems a good result.

But we need to dig a bit further else we can be accused of just looking at one single factor.

90% of all cyclists admitted to hospital have been hit or involved in a collision with a vehicle.

So the greatest risk factor for cyclists is the motorist driving a motor vehicle.

So anything effecting by even a small amount the percentage of all cyclists hit by a vehicle will have a far greater effect to cyclist hospital admissions than a helmet.

“Safety in numbers” is a well-known and undisputed fact. It states that the more cyclists that exists the safer each cyclist becomes.

The question is does the “Mandatory” helmet law reduce the number of people who cycle?

Logic tells us that the number of extra cyclists due to MHL is zero because one does not need a law to wear a helmet.

But does it reduce cyclists? In Victoria the police year in year out fine around 5,500 cyclists every year for riding without a helmet. If even one of these cyclists now never cycles the answer is MHL reduces cycling numbers.

Ok so MHL does reduce the number of cyclists. This increases the danger for all remaining cyclists.

This means MHL has increased the chances of a cyclist being hit by a motorist.

I will leave it up to the experts to decide the fact if this increase in crashes is a net public positive or a negative.

We have had this law in Australia for over 25 years the decider is if this has made Australian cyclists safer is easy to measure by comparing our cycling crash stats with gold standard cycling countries.

This clearly shows that we have failed cyclists. Depending on how one measures these things an Australian cyclist is between 8-22 times more likely to be hit by a motorist than the gold standard countries.

Norman I would like to think your Health Report show is an ideal medium to investigate why no other countries have taken up Victoria’s lead with MHL (excluding NZ) then include all factors to do with cycling and public health with head injuries just being one part of the factors.

Norman as you are part of the medical profession I understand that many in your profession would be unhappy about this program being aired from your history I can see that you are on the side of the public.