E-Scooter Riders Triple Brain Injury Risk vs Motorcyclists
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- E-scooter riders are more than three times as likely to suffer traumatic brain injury or blood vessel damage than motorcyclists, and 1.5 times more likely to injure internal organs, though they have lower bone-fracture risk than cyclists or motorcyclists.
- David Bodansky, a consultant hand, trauma and orthopaedic surgeon at Chelsea and Westminster hospital NHS foundation trust, analyzed the national major trauma registry for collisions in 18 cities in England and Wales between 2020 and 2022, finding brain injuries accounted for more than a third of adult e-scooter injuries.
- Women were involved in about a third more e-scooter collisions than men and more than twice as likely to report severe injuries, which experts linked to handlebars being set at a height for men, causing more chest injuries.
- Children accounted for 16% of e-scooter injuries among the under-18s in the dataset, raising separate safety concerns.
- Less than 6% of e-scooter riders reported wearing a helmet in the study, published in Scientific Reports, despite the vehicles' small wheels making riders prone to going head over heels.
- About 1 million privately owned e-scooters in the UK cannot legally be used on public roads, paths or cycle lanes, though police have confiscated thousands, with the Department for Transport backing rental trials in England since 2020.
- Dr Petya Ventsislavova of Nottingham Trent University called for comprehensive legislation, mandatory safety training, and compulsory helmets, noting e-scooters were introduced without any formal training requirement — unlike cars and motorcycles.
Why it matters: With roughly 1 million unregulated private e-scooters on UK streets, fewer than 6% of riders wearing helmets, and women disproportionately injured by handlebars designed for male body geometry, the data gives regulators and the Department for Transport concrete ammunition to impose mandatory training, helmet rules, and design standards during the ongoing rental trials rather than after further serious injuries accumulate.
