Require ski helmets for kids
Ski helmets at a shop in Huntington Credit: Newsday/Alejandra Villa
Should skiers have to wear helmets on the slopes?
The tragic death of a North Bellmore teen raises the question anew. Erin Malloy-McArdle, 18, died of head injuries after crashing into a tree at Windham Mountain Ski Resort upstate.
We'll never know if a helmet might have saved her because she wasn't wearing one. But the science is clear: Helmets significantly reduce head injuries for skiers and snow-boarders.
That's probably why more than half of those on the slopes are wearing them, double the rate found just seven years earlier. Better yet, the vast majority of kids are wearing helmets.
Everybody on the slopes ought to be wearing a well-fitted helmet, and we encourage every skier to obtain one. But Assemb. Felix Ortiz (D-Brooklyn), who's never been skiing, wants to go further.
For the 12th straight year, he's proposing a mandatory helmet bill. If adopted, it would make New York the first state with such a law.
Helmets are spreading like sunburn on the slopes, so the great bulk of adults probably will be wearing them soon without legislation. Besides, adulthood comes with the right to expose yourself to a certain amount of risk. But children must be protected.
New York requires bicycle riders 14 and younger to wear a helmet. It's time for a similar law requiring helmets for young skiers and snowboarders. hN
