2011 Reducing Injury Through the Promotion and Distribution of Bicycle Helmets
Tavis Bodnarchuk, Kym Haberer, Jenette Hayward, Esther Lee, Meghan McPherson, Stefanie Narvey, Vera Saad
Until recently, Manitoba was a province without bike helmet legislation for children and youth, despite the fact that wearing a correctly fitted bicycle helmet is known to reduce the risk of head and brain injury by as much as 85% (MacKay et al., 2011). Provinces and territories mandating bicycle helmets have seen their rate of bicycle-related head injuries reduced by some 45% reduction. Canadian research also suggests helmet legislation is not associated with reduced cycling.
As a group, we decided to help promote the use of bike helmets among Manitoba youth by raising public awareness, making helmets more easily available through free distribution, and rewarding appropriate bicycle helmet usage. Our long-term goal was to get legislation passed mandating helmet use for all cyclists.
To achieve our objectives, we gave presentations on the importance of using a properly fitted bike helmet at schools in lower-income areas, which are known to be at higher risk for cycling injuries. We also visited paediatric clinics to give away free helmets. One of these visits was covered by local media. We partnered with non-profit organizations to store and distribute helmets— free to children who were caught biking without a helmet— and award prizes to young cyclists who were wearing their helmet. We donated helmets to numerous community organizations, OT/PT clinics and the Winnipeg police bike auction.
We developed a petition advocating helmet legislation in Manitoba and distributed copies to the Ministry of Healthy Living, the provincial Premier, leader of the opposition, and the opposition’s health critic. We distributed a standard letter to MLAs and to local physicians to facilitate their own advocacy for legislation. We also met personally with Jim Rondeau, Manitoba’s Minister of Healthy Living, Youth and Seniors, to present our petition.
This journey has been a very rich experience with many lessons learned. We met with a surprising amount of resistance to what had seemed to us to be a noncontroversial safety measure. We faced the challenge of meeting with numerous community partners despite very busy schedules. As key contacts moved on or became available, we often needed to plan an approach all over again. The intricacies of politics, while not a surprise, were yet another challenge that we had to deal with.
On the other hand, we had many rewarding successes. We distributed 900 free helmets. We discovered and partnered with many vibrant and beneficial community organizations and developed a system of education and reinforcement. We supported political proponents of helmet law and helped encouraged widely felt paediatrician advocacy. Most importantly, bike helmet legislation has been passed.
We are grateful to all those who supported this work, especially the University of Manitoba’s Department of Pediatrics and Child Health, and the Canadian Paediatric Society, who funded our project. Special thanks to our mentors, Drs. Lynne Warda and Patrick McDonald, who guided us through this quest.
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