When 42-year-old Myrthe Boss gets on her bike to go shopping in the Dutch town of Ede, she pops on a helmet... a radical in the Netherlands, where helmet-wearing is rare... pushing for cyclists to think again.
The brain is a very vulnerable organ with limited capacity to recover... If you fall from a bike and sustain a brain injury, this has long-term consequences... A helmet doesn't prevent everything but it does ensure there is less impact from the street on your head.
The number of cyclists seriously injured each year in the Netherlands has risen by 27% in the last decade... if all cyclists wore helmets there would be 85 fewer deaths annually... fatalities in older people and e-bikers have set Dutch road safety back in time 15 years.
In an attempt to change this mentality, the Dutch transport ministry plans to publish guidelines next month on voluntary helmet use... Provinces such as Gelderland and Utrecht are already doing their bit, running campaigns to encourage helmet usage.
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