Still more on helmets: setting an example

Even if I am rarely successful, at least I am persistent. After my recent radical decision to publish my own letter to the editor of the BMJ on the subject of helmet laws, I have been embroiled in a similar controversy in Quebec. Our transport minister is considering such legislation, but the antihelmet lobby is trotting out all the usual chestnuts. This lobby usually consists of pro-bicycling groups. Perhaps as a consequence of having not worn helmets for too long, they are convinced that a helmet law is anticycling. I regard it as quite the opposite. In any event, after an essay by the president of Le Monde a Bicyclette appeared in the Montreal Gazette, I wrote a rebuttal using the same arguments as I gave in my letter to the BMJ. The Gazette was hesitant to publish my contribution because the editor thought it sounded too much as if only doctors knew what was best when it came to …