ROAD SAFETY: According to road safety, a bike helmet reduces the risk of serious head injury by 70%, that of minor injuries by 31% and that of facial injury by 28% ..
It was previously recommended, it is now mandatory. From Wednesday, the law requires children under 12 to wear a bicycle helmet. The measure was announced in October 2015 during an Interministerial Council road safety. Person transporting or accompanying a child under 12 without bike helmets will pay a fourth class fine (90 euros).
“It’s common sense! “
The protective effects of the headset are recognized. According to road safety, it reduces the risk of serious head injury by 70% , that of minor injuries by 31% and that of facial injury by 28%.
The helmet is compulsory in 12 countries of the European Union. In Finland, it is taxed at any age up to 18 years in the Czech Republic and Lithuania, up to 16 years in Spain, Croatia and Estonia or up to 15 years in Sweden, Slovakia and Slovenia.
A measure educational value
“This is to draw attention of all through a measure that is easy to accept,” says Interministerial Delegate for Road Safety Emmanuel Barbe.
“This is a fresh measure which also has an educational value to parents,” he says, “if a parent does not put the child will ask,” Why do not you wear a helmet? “. We want to get the message through the voice of children. ”
In France, the cyclists had their mortality rise again in 2016, when 159 cyclists were killed on the roads (10 more than in 2015, 7%). And within a month of February 2017 exceptionally mild (203 road deaths), the less deadly since March 2013, the mortality of cyclists, it has remained on an upward trend (+ 14% compared to February 2016).
“A nonsense”
However, this measure is “not the most appropriate,” said the Federation of users of the bicycle (FUB). “We are not against but hopefully that will change the road safety of the cyclist, it’s nonsense,” said its president Olivier Schneider, recalling one child under 12 years died bike last year.
“A real road safety measure is to systematize learning the bike mobility in primary school, to learn cycling on public roads […]. It’s not because you wear a helmet that will know how to avoid accidents,” he says.
“And it sends the signal that cycling is dangerous. If we impose the helmet for cyclists, why not impose car passengers and people who take the stairs? There are 400 people who fall every year on the stairs and have acute head injuries,” he quips.
