On Sun, Sep 22, 2002 at 09:12:11PM -0400, Tom@xxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
> On Sunday, September 22, 2002 at 13:07, James N. McBride
> <olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> wrote re "RE: [OM] [OT] Doin' the Airbag Bash" saying:
> > I saw some interesting data on cost a while back. If all the lives
> > claimed to have been saved, by air bag proponents, were indeed saved by
> > the bags the cost would amount to about $ 19,000,000 per life. If most of
> > those lives would have been also saved by the seat belts the economics
> > get interesting. What do you think about the function of your bag John?
> > Do you think the seat belt would have been enough protection without the
> > bag?
> How about injury prevention benefits too?
> Still, the only survivor of Princess Di's crash was the guy in the
> "suicide" seat (front passenger) who was the only one to have done up his
> seatbelt.
<paramedic mode>
Anyone who depends solely on their airbag to protect them in an accident
will find out, the hard way, that it's no substitute for a seat belt. I've
cut a couple of folks out of cars with deployed airbags who didn't survive
to learn from their experience. By comparison, I've never cut someone's seat
belt to extricate them, and only unbuckled three patients, two of whom were
merely too nervous to do it themselves, all in 17 years of volunteer EMS.
I used to believe airbags were basically useless if the user also had on a
properly worn seat belt, and were an overall minus because folks would think
they didn't need the seat belt in an airbag-equipped car. Then, my sister
had an accident: a church bus pulled out across a major highway right in
front of her 1998 Corolla. She struck the bus at about 60 MPH. She had a
sprained wrist and broken foot, but that was all aside from bruises. The doc
treating her said that the air bag probably saved a torn aorta. I'm not sure
I believe that, but it's believable enough that I'm not as negative about
air bags as I used to be.
<paramedic mode off>
< This message was delivered via the Olympus Mailing List >
< For questions, mailto:owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx >
< Web Page: http://Zuiko.sls.bc.ca/swright/olympuslist.html >
|