Well obviously if you had better drivers and interactions with them there would be lass fatalities. That's kind of a no brainer. Many people have avoided serious injury from wearing one though. I've never thought that my helmet would do much for me in a serious bike/car tangle. In fact I wasn't wearing a helmet when I did my share of tangles with cars when messin'. I simply didn't hit my head. Of course a messengers riding skills can generally save them in these situations.

In that stat about rising head injuries despite helmet use in the eary 90's that sort of coincides with the mainstreaming of extreme riding, and it's explosion in popularity. There are ALOT more too-rad-for-mom-and-dad riders out there now. More trials, more trails, more dirt jumpin, more down hill. Is the explosion of this type of riding being represented in the stats?..... somehow I don't think so.