No Helmet and No Brains

This has only a passing connection to anything related to politics, but I don't care. It addresses a big pet peeve that I have as a resident of this state, and I'm grateful to Stewart L. Cohen, president of the Brain Injury Association of Pennsylvania, for bringing up this issue again (this appeared in today's issue of The Philadelphia Inquirer).

Helmet law costly in lives, cash

I am a pro football fan, a lifelong Eagles fan, so I fully appreciate that the all-popular sport can bring attention to social issues in a way that few other things can.

On its Sept. 18 Sportscenter program, ESPN televised a report about two football players who also have an interest in riding motorcycles.

One of them, Jamie Henderson, a former defensive back for the New York Jets, was in a motorcycle accident in April 2004. Despite his injuries, he is now conditioning himself to get back into pro football. "I'm alive because I wore a helmet," he told ESPN. State law in Georgia, where he was riding, requires motorcyclists to wear helmets.

Henderson's story was followed by an interview with Ben Roethlisberger, star quarterback of the Pittsburgh Steelers. He said he liked to ride a motorcycle but didn't want to be told to wear a helmet.

Noting that it was all perfectly legal, Roethlisberger said, "Pennsylvania law doesn't make me wear a helmet... ."

Ironic, isn't it, that a person whose profession requires that he wear a helmet to protect himself in an organized contact sport can legally go bare-headed on the road at speeds of 65 miles per hour?

I thank ESPN for putting Pennsylvania's wrong-headed law back in the news. Its proponents will say it's a dead issue, settled by the General Assembly in 2003. I say the issue should never die so long as people are dying or suffering permanent injuries as a result and the rest of us are affected.

Who, for example, pays the medical bills for brain injury when there is an accident, especially when a motorcyclist suffers a catastrophic brain injury? How does Pennsylvania's law affect our overall medical policy?

The fact is that when private insurance runs out - and that happens quickly in catastrophic brain injury hospitalization and rehabilitation - Medicaid picks up the tab. That means taxpayers like you and me.

Medicaid is out of control. In Pennsylvania, the 2006 Medicaid budget is about $4.4 billion. Based on a study issued last month by the National Highway Safety Administration, it is indisputable that allowing motorcyclists to ride without helmets will cost lives and dramatically increase Medicaid costs in Pennsylvania.

The NHTSA study examined Florida's experience after it legalized riding a motorcycle without a helmet five years ago. In the three years after the law's repeal, the state saw an 81 percent increase motorcycle-accident fatalities.

The NHTSA study also found that head injuries have become more expensive to treat.

The average hospital cost to treat such an injury was $45,602, more than four times the $10,000 insurance non-helmeted riders are required to carry. Preusser Research Group, a Connecticut research firm specializing in transportation and highway safety, conducted the study for the federal agency.

In the three years after the repeal, 61 percent of the 933 fatally injured motorcyclists were not wearing helmets.

"The numbers are pretty compelling that Florida has paid a high price," said NHTSA spokesman Rae Tyson. "There is enough here for any state contemplating a helmet repeal to realize there are serious consequences."

Helmet laws are not about singling out boys and their motorcycle toys. They are about common sense. We are told to buckle up, so why can't we be told to wear a helmet?

The Brain Injury Association of Pennsylvania has some questions for our state legislators. Is there any legitimate reason why Pennsylvania does not require motorcycle helmet use? How much is this helmet law costing Pennsylvania taxpayers? If helmet use were required by law and enforced, how many lives - and Medicaid dollars - could be saved for the benefit of others? Is there any reason why Pennsylvania Medicaid dollars are being spent to subsidize reckless behavior?

It's time to require all motorcyclists in Pennsylvania to wear helmets.

Freedom of choice? It has trumped public safety and the public interest.