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Rapid Responses: Rapid Responses published:
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Social or physical environment?
- Innes Reid (19 November 2004)
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Cycling and health: time for joined up thinking
- Simon Brooke (20 November 2004)
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Of walking, cycling, trousers and cab drivers
- Adrian S. Blaj (21 November 2004)
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Innes Reid, Research Officer University of Leeds, LS2 9JT
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I wonder whether we're not seeing the wood for the trees. Perhaps the explanation for the stunningly different levels of bicycle use between the Netherlands and the UK is that one is much flatter than the other? I suggest a study looking at cycle use and "hilliness" be performed. Competing interests: Sole member of the "Make Leeds Less Hilly" campaign. |
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Simon Brooke, Director Scaffie Ltd, Main Street, Auchencairn, Scotland, DG7 1QU
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Dear sir In his letter 'Promoting walking and cycling as an alternative to using cars' your correspondent Patrick Lingwood correctly observes that 'the weight of evidence, however, shows that the most prominent barrier to cycling is the perception of safety...'; the key word in this phrase being, of course, perception. In fact, per unit distance, cycling is substantially safer than walking[1]. Cycling is, and should be promoted as, a safe and enjoyable activity, an activity which has much to contribute to improving the nation's health. Yet our health professionals seem determined to persuade us that this isn't so. The British Medical Association's recent briefing paper on cycle helmets[2] includes the statement 'Each year over 50 people aged 15 years and under are killed by cycling accidents, with 70-80 per cent of these resulting from traumatic brain injury'. This is not merely untrue - it is wildly untrue. In fact, in no year in the past decade have 50 children died; in the most recent year for which we have figures, only nineteen died, of whom only ten had head injuries[3]. In a related briefing paper 'Cycling and health'[4], the BMA start with the sentence 'Action should be taken to ... reduce the high rate of fatal and serious accidents suffered by cyclists...'. As I've made clear above, there is no 'high rate of fatal accidents'; the actual death and injury figures for cyclists are substantially lower than the comparable figures for pedestrians, and the BMA is not urging the introduction of walking helmets. The BMA is a respected organisation. This scaremongering cannot but increase the false public perception of cycling as a dangerous activity. In doing so, it deters people from cycling and increases the risk to individual cyclists. Finally, the danger to cyclists is overwhelmingly from motor vehicles; of 114 cyclists who died on Britain's roads in 2003, 95 had been struck by a motor vehicle[4]. No cycling helmet is designed to survive or to protect from an impact from a ton of fast moving metal. Promoting cycle helmets as a response to this sort of threat is quite simply the wrong approach: it increases the perception of danger without significantly increasing protection. Of course 115 deaths - two per week - is still far too many, but it is not only a small proportion of total road deaths, it is also already falling faster than other categories of road death[5]. If the medical profession wish to reduce this further, then training of cyclists will do far more than promoting helmet wearing; but the only real solution is to change the attitude of drivers. In summary, cycling in Britain is already a safe activity, but is wrongly perceived as dangerous; as an activity, it is getting safer steadily, and faster than any other road transport activity; and the present attitude of the medical profession as reflected by the activities of its professional association is actively counter productive. Sincerely Simon Brooke [1]<URL:http://www.statistics.gov.uk/StatBase/ssdataset.asp?vlnk=7250&Pos=&ColRank=1&Rank=272> [2]<URL:http://www.bma.org.uk/ap.nsf/Content/Cyclhelmet> [3] <URL:http://www.parliament.the-stationery- office.co.uk/pa/cm200203/cmhansrd/vo031110/text/31110w04.htm#31110w04.html_sbhd1> [4]<URL:http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/dft_control/documents/contentservertemplate/dft_index.hcst?n=11585&l=5> [5]<URL:http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/dft_transstats/documents/page/dft_transstats_507489.hcsp> Competing interests: None declared |
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Adrian S. Blaj, Psychiatrist London, England
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I must confess I use cabs quite frequently. Not long time ago one of the cab drivers told me about his encounter with a 'slow' driver; he got quite angry with a very slow driver in front of him and when the chance arose (stuck in the traffic) he walked towards that particular driver and politely wanted to find out the cause of the slow driving. The driver was an old man who responded indignantly: 'Young man, I have been driving for over 40 years and I have never had a car accident'. To which my cab driver responded promptly: 'I bet you don't know how many accidents you have caused behind you in those 40 years!' Without advocating a particular modality of transportation and without having the time to do some searches, I have the feeling that the probability of being killed in an accident decreases in the following order: pedestrian, cyclist, car, train, aeroplane (the probability of being killed in an aeroplane crash is equal to that of being killed by your trousers in the morning). If one is going to infer that there is an inverse correlation between the speed of locomotion and the probability of being killed/hurt, the contraargument would be the direct correlation between the frequency of a certain modality of transportation and the probability of being killed/hurt --- I am afraid that either way (if my assumption is correct) the idealistic way of walking or cycling to work has its inherent setbacks and dangers. Personally I wouldn't mind having a National Health Service chauffeur! Competing interests: None declared |
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