Activist Calls For Delaware Motorcycle Helmet Law
September 16th, 2008 by Dan GaffneyFrom listener and safety advocate Chuck Jackson:
After reading your front page lead story that carried the banner headline, “Motorcycle Fatalities Soar,” I would like to offer a few observations, based on my experiences as a former EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) in Baltimore County (MD), and senior staff member at the Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore. The story of eight motorcycle deaths in less than a month here in Delaware, along with data showing an alarming increase in motorcycle fatalities nationwide, makes a compelling case for anyone who has anything to do with public safety in this state to step up and support changes in Delaware’s motorcycle helmet laws.
I find it unconscionable that in a state known for its tough stance on highway safety, motorcyclists are required to “display” helmets, not “wear” them. In other words, a helmet must be on the bike and not the biker. It’s like having a child safety seat law that requires a child safety seat to be “displayed” in the vehicle with the child sitting next to it, not in it. Critics will argue that mandating laws for children is necessary because they are minors, and lack the maturity to think responsibly for themselves. However, when it comes to adults, they are old enough and more mature to make their own decisions. That is, until they are critically injured or killed in a crash they might have survived without permanent damage, if they had been protected.
In Maryland, helmets are required, and their use has been credited with saving countless lives. The motorcycles might be engineered for speed, but the human body, and more importantly, the head, isn’t. As an EMT, and Director of Public Affairs at the Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore, I saw the head trauma, first hand, among critically injured patients who, some said, were not lucky enough to die. “Unlucky,” in the sense that their recovery would take months and sometimes years in rehab, and often with debilitating brain damage and other neurological head and neck injuries that disabled them or left them dysfunctional for the rest of their lives. I recall one admission of a young man who was flown in by Maryland State Police med-evac helicopter with his helmet next to him on the backboard. The helmet, removed by paramedics, was cracked by the impact of his head on a guardrail along the highway that, police said, occurred at a speed above 50 miles per hour. He was badly bruised, his bones broken, but he escaped serious head, neck and spinal cord injuries because of the helmet.
It is time for the citizens (taxpayers) of this great state to express their support for strengthening our helmet laws by requiring their use. This effort will face some tough opposition from the so-called “freedom riders” who insist that this is a “constitutional” issue and not one of safety. The response to that must come from the area’s fire and EMS (Emergency Medical Services) personnel who are called to rescue these victims every week. It must also come from the entire medical community, including ER doctors, trauma nurses, the rehab clinics, and other health care professionals who are often called to the bedside of critically injured motorcyclists who were riding without helmets.
If there is going to be meaningful, life-saving changes in our helmet laws, this effort must also have the support among our elected leaders who will be held accountable for the unnecessary and expensive carnage that will continue to occur if they do nothing to enhance safety for motorcyclists and others who share the highways with them. As a former public information officer with Maryland State Police, I feel confident that Delaware State Police would support it and aggressively enforce it, once enacted. Have you ever seen a trooper assigned to the motor (cycle) unit riding without one?
Chuck Jackson, Executive Director
Citizen Advocates For Safe & Efficient Travel
P.O. Box 292
Nassau, DE 19969
September 16th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Im not interested in your statistics on riding without a helmet. I prefer to ride without one myself and am lucky to live in a state that does not require the driver to wear a helmet. Next your gonna tell me what type of footwear and eventually what color laces ill be required to use. If you wanna wear a helmet……wear one. But dont dictate what others should wear. If you want to give a crap about bike riders, make all car and truck drivers complete a course designed to be more careful and diligent to riders on bikes. Majority of bike crashes are due to the negligence of car and truck drivers. Now lets get this rolling. Non motorcycle operators should be careful and complete courses to save bike riders lives. Thats my opinion
September 16th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
Yes I have seen Policeman, not on (DUTY) without a helmet rideing,A lot of people in Goverment do not wear one when they ride.
When are people going to grow up, and stop worrieing about what everyones is doing ,and start worrieing more on what they do.
This country is in enough bad shape now,that our so called leaders that we place, need to worrie about more important issues, instead weather or not I am wearing a helemt.
If I choose as an adult to take a chance,and ride my bike with out one then thats on me and my famliy not yours, or some other persons worrie.
If you dont like to see things in the operating room or shock trauma then change jobs, but don’t tell me what I have to wear and not to wear,I vote and pay Taxes just like you.I understand that you care and thats all well and good,but motorcycles are not the ones killing people it is how there driven .If you want to do some good,make people take better safety courses, but dont hurt my way of life, over some other dumb ass drivers who are talking on the phone or reading a damm news paper on there way to there goverment JOBS!
September 16th, 2008 at 2:46 pm
Activist? No. You are a former everything who is currently nothing more than a “safety nanny”, with nothing better to do than attempt to subvert the bill of rights using mindless rhetoric in an attempt to give the government more power and grow the bureaucracy.
You make it sound as if people cannot venture from their plastic safety bubble houses without seeing “carnage” all around them. As a former EMT, you know there are many injuries to many parts of the body from a variety of accidental causes and assaults, so cut the BS.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
I read with interest Chuck Jackson’s opinion about Delaware’s motorcycle helmet laws. For the record, I always buckle up, and always wear a helmet when riding my horse or motorcycle. I am a well-educated, rational adult. Traffic safety statistics, knowledge of the laws of physics, and basic common sense have convinced me that wearing a helmet while motorbiking along busy highways at high speeds is in my best interest. I do not need governmental bureaucracy or legislation to mandate that I do so, and I am strongly opposed to laws that interfere with the rights of individuals to manage their own lives.
The only legitimate function of government is to secure our rights as citizens: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. There is no “right” to protection from stupidity; there is only responsibility to use our reasoning ability to make sound decisions. We are all free to be as sensible or stupid as we choose as long as our actions do not infringe upon the rights of others. If I, knowing the dangers, choose to engage in dangerous activity and injure only myself, I bear the consequences, but it should be of no concern to anyone else. I should be held responsible only for causing injuy to another.
Driver error — not the absence of a helmet — is the leading cause (71%) of traffic fatalities. Additionally, inattentive driving — in particular, cell phone distraction — causes about one-fourth of all collisions (Aetna Insurance traffic statistics, 2006.) If a 150-lb. person on a 300-lb motorcycle collides with a SUV whose driver was too busy applying make-up or yakking on the cell phone to notice the bike, head injuries are likely to be the least of his concerns. If you indeed avocate safe and efficient travel, Mr. Jackson, the better course would be to push for stronger penalties for distracted driving, which does affect the lives of others.
There are already too many laws, and I disagree that the State has an interest in protecting its citizens from themselves. Meddlesome, intrusive legislation does NOT create “a more prefect union;” instead, by removing the responsibility for decisionmaking about personal matters, it actually encourages dependence and mental and ethical laziness. Creeping bureaucracy is insidious, and I could expound at great lengths upon the pernicious effects the last 40 years of governmental policy have had on our culture — but that is the subject for another essay. Moreover, if the government interferes with the right to take care of oneself (or not,) in what else would it interfere? Would it next legislate footwear? (The high-heeled, sexy pumps that I love are notorious for causing foot problems and sprained ankles; should they not be illegl?) What about ice cream which, because of its high-fat content, could contribute to fatal heart attacks? You suggest that the financial burden of head injuries are borne by tax payers, hospitals, and the public — innocent bystanders who had nothing to do with the the collisions. You are correct; this is unjust, but I have a simple answer to that: stop. Make it clear that there will be no free ride for people who behave irresponsibly, and just watch how quickly they change their behavior!
As a safety advocate, you have every right to educate, persuade, convince, and cajole the motorbiking public into adopting safe and self-protective habits. You do not, however, have the right to impose your will on others. I encourage you instead to conduct workshops and promote motorcycle safety awareness not just for bikers but, more importantly, for non-biking automobile drivers who are often well-intentioned but ignorant about how the forces of motion affect a small, nimble, vehicle like a motorcycle.
Lastly, the spike in collisions and deaths among motorbikers has less to do with helmetless-ness and more with the fact that ridership has grown exponentially in the last decade. This increase is partly a byproduct of high gas prices which make smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicles desirable, and partly the result of baby-boomers retiring in better health and with more disposable income than previous generations enjoyed. The majority of these new riders are safety-conscious, middle-aged and older adults who DO wear helmets, NOT because the government requires it, but because it is the smart thing to do. This fact alone makes the case AGAINST helmet laws in the state of Delaware.
Andrea Lukowsky-Longo
September 16th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
“listener and safety advocate” my A$$!
Listen up Chuck. If you knew anything about motorcycle safety you would not be pushing helmets. Sure a helmet can prevent death or brain injury within certain very limited situations. There may be just enough of those conditions ocurring to warrant reccomending to motorcyclists that they make an intelligent choice on whether their planned day of riding should include the wearing of a helmet or not. But, “Its not about the utility of helmets, its about the futility of helmet laws”.
The old Haddonistic mantra pushing crash survival instead of crash prevention has really worn itself out, don’t you think? Those stats you throw out include the fact that fatalities and brain injuries are increasing at the same rate in states with mandatory helmet laws as those which do not. So, slapping more helmets on more heads is not an effective solution to the problem.
What else has happened in the past ten years that might be a cause for the increased crashes and injuries? You tell me how many motorists were talking on cell phones while driving 11 years ago as compared to today. How much texting, dvd watching, and interactive satellite information was being undertaken while driving 11 years ago? Without front, passenger, and side impact airbags. Without crash resistant car frames. Without OnStar. Without mandatory seatbelts. How much more attention to driving were motorists 11 years ago? And you think not enough helmets is the problem? Are you really that stupid?
I hope not. I think you are just joining the ranks of the other sensationalistic so called journalists and attention seeking dweebs who like to light fires under emotionally combustible issues in order to draw attention to themselves. Your dishonest and unambitious Chuck. If you were really interested in motorcyclists safety you would get off your A$$ and do some serious investigation and publish the results that demonstrate that until the distracted drivers out there are dealt with, crashes will continue to increase.
And maybe you ought to take a refresher course on U.S. History and learn just what it is that all of us veterans living and dead put our ass on the line for. It sure as hell was not for you to mother us.
September 16th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
Ummm….I see your point and agree we’ve had enough govt. interference into our personal lives and sure, it ought to be up to the individual whether or not they wear their lids. My partner doesn’t wear a helmet and I occasionally do…just don’t like them. At the same time, though…why do you want to mandate compulsory safe driving courses for motorists to provide you safety while riding? If you don’t wear a helmet because a) you don’t have to and b) you don’t like you also know the risk involved should you have an accident, regardless of cause or fault, no? “Take safety courses to be more diligent to riders…”…presumably so motorists don’t cause an accident to knock you off the bike on your unprotected head? That seems like a one way street.
September 16th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
I get so sick and tired of the mentality of people so worried about their rights being trampled upon. People in the biker community wonder why they’re still stigmatized. You know what I say? Leave the law in Delaware intact, let the process of natural selection run its due course. I choose to put the helmet on because I realize how many morons are on the freaking road, ignoring that fact and relying on fate to protect you is the way of the ignorant.
September 17th, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Since when does the state decide what is best for us? I believe everything is a choice, whether good or bad, and the state has NO RIGHT to tell us to wear a helmet nor a SEATBELT for that matter. We keep forgetting that insurance companies cover us, if we are paying our monthly premiums. It should be at our own choice what whether we want a seatbelt on or not. The statistics are there, you make a choice-die or survive! We the people have common sense, well- maybe not all-but not everyone should pay for ignorance! If we keep letting the state or federal “make-up” the rules, where’s our true freedom? Not there, because our wallets are more interesting than our freedoms!
September 19th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
Weezelguy said “I get so sick and tired of the mentality of people so worried about their rights being trampled upon.”
If a medical study regarding the increased risks of basil skull fracture convinced legislators to outlaw helmets, what would you do? Go along with it, or insist on your right to decide on the proper protection for yourself? That is what I insist on - the right to make these important decisions for myself. Well, there is such a study, and though it is hypothetical and facetious to think the government would make this legislation, because there is so much money at stake, think about it. What would you do? If your answer is that you would do nothing but go along with it, then my question is what does it take for you to insist upon your rights? If the government says they are going to insert a tracking chip into your body, would that trigger you to take action? Exactly, how far does the government have to go before you say “Enough! That is too far!” ?
September 20th, 2008 at 9:58 am
Dear Nancy.
Wearing or not wearing a helmet is a personal decision that has no consequences for anyone other than the helmeted or unhelmeted persons life.
Inattentive distracted driving has consequences for anyone sharing the road with that person. And for motorcyclists, helmeted or not, the consequences are almost always severe.
Perhaps all motorcyclists would be better off wearing helmets because of the distracted drivers out there hitting us at record levels. I don’t think so, but if you buy into that fantasy don’t let me distract from your uninformed beliefs. Do not however try and rationalize to me that I bear the burden of responsibility to be safe in crashes with right of way violation committing distracted drivers, and that I am at fault for not wearing a helmet. That thinking is as logical as saying I am at fault because I am riding a motorcycle in the first place.
March 5th, 2009 at 9:33 am
I found this great link for Delaware Helmet laws: http://www.ironhorsehelmets.com/StateDeleware.htm