Mandatory motorcycle helmet laws have long been the primary push by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). However, U.S. Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) and several colleagues from multiple states are calling for the agency to shift its focus to motorcycle crash prevention and leave states to decide for themselves if they will require helmets.
The NHTSA is a federal agency charged with ensuring motor vehicle and highway safety throughout America. Although its reach is nationwide, the NHTSA is barred from using federal money to lobby state and local leaders to implement its suggested standards. However, that does not stop NHTSA encouraging states to promote helmet use.
Rep. Sensenbrenner and his co-sponsors have proposed a House resolution calling for a continued ban on such lobbying and would proclaim that the House recognizes motorcycle crash prevention as "the primary source of motorcycle safety." The resolution asks NHTSA to make rider education and crash prevention its top motorcycle safety priority.
Change in Focus
Shifting the focus from mandatory helmet laws to crash prevention makes sense. Though helmets are reportedly 37 percent effective in preventing motorcyclist fatalities, preventing an accident from happening is 100 percent effective in avoiding a fatality. Moreover, rider education and accident prevention would eliminate other physical injuries to motorcyclists and car passengers and would avoid the financial losses of a collision.
Bigger Picture
In terms of the federal system, the question is whether federal agencies should be allowed to push one-size-fits-all programs onto individual states. NHTSA has a role to play on motorcycle safety, but it's up to individual states to make their own decisions on helmet laws. Moreover, a licensed motorcyclist should have the freedom to choose whether to wear a helmet or not. Failing to wear a helmet affects no one but that individual and the federal government should not be spending money to protect people from their own choices.
More importantly, pressing states to enact mandatory motorcycle helmet laws treats the symptoms, not the problem. Education, training and motorcycle accident prevention will strike at the root of the problem and save more lives than helmets.
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