There soon may be another state in the US that allows adults to choose for themselves whether they wear a motorcycle helmet or not.

Missouri recently voted to repeal both its helmet and abortion laws, although the former is yet to be signed off by the Governor.

If it does, there will be 19 states with motorcycle helmet laws for all riders.

They are: Alabama, California, DC, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and West Virginia.

Only Illinois, Iowa and New Hampshire have no helmet use law.

Adults only

The remaining states have varying laws requiring minors to wear a motorcycle helmet while six of those states require adults to have $10,000 in insurance and wear a helmet in their first year of riding.

Adult riders are varyingly considered 18 or 21. Missouri says riders over 18 should be all.owed to decide on helmet use.

There has been a steady move toward liberalising US helmet laws in recent years.

But here’s an interesting example.

In 1977 Texas moved from a universal helmet law to an adult helmet option like Missouri wants.

There followed a 35% increase in motorcycle fatalities. Texas reinstated its universal helmet law in 1989 and deaths dropped by 11%. The law makers changed their minds yet again in 1997 to cover only riders younger than 21 and deaths leapt 31%.

As Dudley (William H Macy) tells Woody (John Travolta) in “Wild Hogs”: “62% vof all motorcycle fatalities could be prevented with the use of an approved DOT helmet.”

According to the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, for every 100 motorcyclists killed in crashes while not wearing a helmet, 37 could have been saved had they worn helmets.

Yet, the use of motorcycle helmets in the US continues to decline to about half from 71% in 2000.

While the US public health institute the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found the most common injuries in motorcycle crashes are to the riders’ feet or legs, the next most common location for non-fatal rider injuries was to the neck and head, accounting for 22%.

Source: MotorbikeWriter.com