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You have to laugh
I was raking over the old Research Report 30 stuff writing a followup
(my questions to the DfT remian unanswered). While I was verifying the pre-existing pro-helmet stance of the authors (which was easy: four of them are effectively joined at the hip and have a history of pro-helmet publications) I came across this gem: url:http://www.imj.ie/news_detail.php?nNewsId=2518&nVolId=97 Apparently a helmet law for children is right up there with not allowing children to operate farm machinery in the indicators for a country which is serious about child safety. How's that for a sense of perspective? Guy === May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting. http://chapmancentral.demon.co.uk |
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#2
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You have to laugh
I came across this gem:
url:http://www.imj.ie/news_detail.php?nNewsId=2518&nVolId=97 Apparently a helmet law for children is right up there with not allowing children to operate farm machinery in the indicators for a country which is serious about child safety. How's that for a sense of perspective? Why on earth does ICEland have a law for barrier fencing around domestic swimming pools? |
#3
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You have to laugh
"Mark Thompson" (change warm for hot)
wrote in message ... Why on earth does ICEland have a law for barrier fencing around domestic swimming pools? You wouldn't have thought it that likely a place like that would have many of them, but OTOH they have plenty of geothermal energy for hot water and heating so who knows - maybe they do have significant numbers of heated/hot water pools in their backgardens ;-). Can't say I saw any when I was there, but... Namaskar Rich |
#4
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You have to laugh
"Just zis Guy, you know?" writes:
I was raking over the old Research Report 30 stuff writing a followup (my questions to the DfT remian unanswered). While I was verifying the pre-existing pro-helmet stance of the authors (which was easy: four of them are effectively joined at the hip and have a history of pro-helmet publications) I came across this gem: url:http://www.imj.ie/news_detail.php?nNewsId=2518&nVolId=97 Apparently a helmet law for children is right up there with not allowing children to operate farm machinery in the indicators for a country which is serious about child safety. My mother was personally responsible, as a civil servant, for drafting the legislation which bans children in this country from operating farm machinery. All her children, without exception, operated farm machinery during their childhood with her full knowledge and apparent approval. I learned to drive, age eleven, on an old grey fergie taking hay bales up to the barn (and reversing a fully loaded trailer of bales *into* the barn, which was quite a kick at eleven). -- (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/ ;; Friends don't send friends HTML formatted emails. |
#5
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You have to laugh
"Mark Thompson" (change warm for hot) writes:
I came across this gem: url:http://www.imj.ie/news_detail.php?nNewsId=2518&nVolId=97 Apparently a helmet law for children is right up there with not allowing children to operate farm machinery in the indicators for a country which is serious about child safety. How's that for a sense of perspective? Why on earth does ICEland have a law for barrier fencing around domestic swimming pools? Geothermal energy in abundance. Plenty of really nice outdoor swimming pools in Iceland, many of them not just warm but hot. -- (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/ ;; Friends don't send friends HTML formatted emails. |
#6
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You have to laugh
On Sun, 08 Feb 2004 21:23:30 +0000 someone who may be "Just zis Guy,
you know?" wrote this:- I was raking over the old Research Report 30 stuff writing a followup (my questions to the DfT remian unanswered). Funny you should mention that. Just this morning in another place the following was posted. ================================================== ============== After some discussion via email with the Department for Transport, they have issued corrections for errors published in 'Bicycle Helmets - A review of their effectiveness: A critical review of the Literature, Road Safety Research Report No 30' Section 5, Post legislation, teenager wearing rate changed to 45% from the 74% published. Section 1, Head Injury, emergency admissions, changed from published 2.8% to 0.28%. The incorrect 2.8% claim made cycling appear 10 more likely to result in being admitted to hospital than the data would suggest. One admission in 359 being a cyclist. 'Head injuries' sustained when bicycling was the primary diagnosis in one in 1051 admissions. The 74% claim made the helmet law in Victoria appear successful at increasing helmet wearing rates. In fact the law resulted in 19,229 penalty notices being issued (in a state with about 4.4 million population), discouraging cycling by over 40% for teenagers and resulting in less than half of teenagers wearing helmets and this should be considered. Children's safety was reduced but the reports overlooks this aspects. The report RSRR 30 has been in circulation for over a year, freely available to the public, referred to in Parliament, quoted by Royal Mail in support of their actions of trying to force postal workers to wear helmets, resulting in one dismissal that is being challenged for unfair dismissal. Other parts of the RSRR 30 report are misleading. The DfT are interested in providing reliable and accurate information and may change other parts when they become aware of unreliable data and comments, published in the report. I will continue to discuss the misleading/unreliable aspects with the DfT. Even if the report is fully corrected for misleading aspects it will still be bias in overall presentation and should be withdrawn to prevent further damage. Additional information on helmets is available at http://www.cyclehelmets.org http://www.magma.ca/~ocbc http://www.cycle-helmets.com Sincerely Colin Clarke ================================================== ============== -- David Hansen, Edinburgh | PGP email preferred-key number F566DA0E I will always explain revoked keys, unless the UK government prevents me using the RIP Act 2000. |
#7
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You have to laugh
"David Hansen" wrote in message
... Funny you should mention that. Just this morning in another place the following was posted. After some discussion via email with the Department for Transport, they have issued corrections for errors published in 'Bicycle Helmets - A review of their effectiveness: A critical review of the Literature, Road Safety Research Report No 30' I can't see the corrections yet, but well done Colin Clarke for some good and patient work. I think it has been far from easy even to get them started on the process of amending this report. -- Guy === WARNING: may contain traces of irony. Contents may settle after posting. http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk |
#8
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You have to laugh
Just zis Guy, you know? wrote:
"David Hansen" wrote in message ... I can't see the corrections yet, but well done Colin Clarke for some good and patient work. I think it has been far from easy even to get them started on the process of amending this report. Maybe you would like to correct the distorted view you gave of the original article? http://www.imj.ie/news_detail.php?nN...2518&nVolId=97 To suggest that it argues to : Apparently a helmet law for children is right up there with not allowing children to operate farm machinery in the indicators for a country which is serious about child safety is a mendacious distortion on your part. It simply lists all the child safety specific legislation enacted in EEC countries and its conclusion about the direction Ireland should take indicates the importance it puts on cycle helmets : ie it does not mention them, How Should We Proceed in Ireland? We should learn from experiences elsewhere. Our greatest challenges are road-related injuries, accidental poisoning and housefires. Comparative analyses with other EU countries show that we lag far behind the best in Europe in these areas of child injury prevention. We cannot tolerate a very low rate of seat belt use and a high number of children travelling unrestrained or in the front seat of cars. We must ensure that potential medicinal and household poisons are sold in child-resistant packaging. Our record in relation to house fires is the worst in the EU and we must ensure that all households have a functioning smoke alarm. We need to embrace examples of good practice from other EU countries (most particularly the Scandanavian countries, the Netherlands and the UK), enact appropriate legislation and ensure that it is properly enforced15. Otherwise our child injury toll will continue at its present unacceptably high rate Guy, if you are going to continue to claim the high moral ground in your arguments with regard to Paul Smith's mis-use and distortion of data and articles, you would be best advised to avoid such distortions yourself pk |
#9
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You have to laugh
PK wrote:
is a mendacious distortion on your part. It simply lists all the child safety specific legislation enacted in EEC countries and its conclusion about the direction Ireland should take indicates the importance it puts on cycle helmets : ie it does not mention them, But the paper as a whole does, of course. "Whilst no EU member state has adopted all ten preventive policy measures that were conducted in recent research by Towner et al12, Sweden and Spain do show commitment to using policy to influence the reduction of childhood injury by adopting most of the measures outlined in Table 1", and what should we find in Table 1 but a clear reference to bicycle helmets for children, followed by a claim that "Correctly fitted, bicycle helmets reduce the risk of head and brain injury by 63-88%". Since the article clearly implies that Ireland should be following examples of good practice elsewhere, and the only mention of cycle helmets is a bullet-point figure of how wonderful they are, saying (a) that it does not mention them on the grounds the conclusion doesn't specifically mention them where the other content does or (b) does not at the very least imply it is a road to follow which is good practice is bordering on the sort of behaviour you're on your high horse about... Pete. -- Peter Clinch University of Dundee Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Medical Physics, Ninewells Hospital Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK net http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/ |
#10
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You have to laugh
"PK" wrote in message
... Maybe you would like to correct the distorted view you gave of the original article? http://www.imj.ie/news_detail.php?nN...2518&nVolId=97 Or maybe I wouldn't because maybe I think that lumping lid laws in with legislation keeping children off farm machinery is a gross distortion of the actual danger of cycling. And maybe, just maybe, there was one of those famous "traces of irony" in there. Well, I apologise to anyone who was misled: I refer to the chart, not to the body of the article. If you look at the attribution for the chart it is Towner and Towner, two of the authors of the DfT's "independent" Research Report 30. They, and two of the other authors, are connected via CAPT (url:http://www.capt.org.uk/course/Course%20information.doc). All four of these have prior publications in which they advocate helmets. There are some reports with them listed as co-authors which advocate compulsion. I have seen the same chart elsewhere, but not in documents which are freely available (which is not to say they don't exist and my Googling is deficient). I am spending Actual Money buying reports from both sides of the argument, including (God help me) Lee, who co-wrote a masterpiece of muddled thinking recently. I asked the DfT last year what was the background of the other two authors, on the grounds that any review of a controversial subject which includes among its authors four who have already come out on one side of the argument is unlikely to reflect a true balance, however well-intentioned and expert they may be (and I have heard good reports of their other work). The DfT did not reply. As usual the basis for their claim is TRT. If TRT were removed from the equation the whole pro lobby would pretty much disappear. -- Guy === WARNING: may contain traces of irony. Contents may settle after posting. http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk |
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