Tornado Motorcycle Helmets

BIRMINGHAM -- UAB researchers say that motorcycle helmets, football helmets and bicycle helmets offer a practical, inexpensive solution to reducing the risk of head injuries during a tornado and are calling on the federal Centers for Disease Control to incorporate the advice in its tornado preparedness messages.

"It's such a common sense idea that we wonder why it hasn't caught on," said Scott Crawford, an epidemiologist and one of authors of "Safety Helmets: A Practical Inexpensive Solution for Reducing the Risk of Head Injuries Resulting from Tornadoes."

Crawford and a team from the University of Alabama at Birmingham Injury Control Research Center reviewed historical tornado research and Jefferson County coroner reports of April 27 tornado victims in preparing the "commentary" paper posted on its website.

The center is partnering with the Alabama Head Injury Foundation to develop a statewide public awareness campaign.

The report notes that the CDC's Emergency Prevention and Response website instructs people to "protect your head with anything available -- even your hands" but never mentions helmets.

"To us it is obvious that protective measures suggested by the CDC, while well-intended, are nonetheless insufficient for protecting against possible head and neck injuries," the UAB report stated.

CDC officials would not comment directly on UAB's report, said Melissa Dankel, CDC spokeswoman.

"But I can tell you that anything that can reduce injuries and death merits further evaluation," she said.

A review of 50 years of literature found that head injuries were the most common cause of tornado deaths, said Russ Fine, the center's director and one of the co-authors of the report. "You don't need extensive studies to call for this, what you need is common sense," he said.

A Birmingham News review of the Jefferson County coroner reports published last month found that at least 11 of the 21 deaths could be attributed to a blow to the head or broken neck. The county medical examiner, Dr. Robert Brissie, who has said helmets could have saved some of those lives, is also a co-author of the report.

A motorcycle helmet with a face shield and neck support would be the ideal helmet. But any helmet is better than no helmet, Fine said.