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Daylorb · 11-30-2011, 05:53 AM

On side airbags:

As of 2008, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has investigated over 1,500 crashes where SABs deployed. Sixty of the crashes involved children (ages 13 and under). NHTSA has reported only one child who has been injured by a side airbag; a 3-year old sitting unrestrained in the front seat (of course you wouldn't let your 3-yr-old ride in the front seat, let alone unrestrained!) who sustained minor facial skin lacerations from the side airbag cover. No children are known to have been seriously or fatally injured by a side airbag. A recent study of children in side-impact crashes found no increased risk of injury to children age 15 and younger associated with side airbag deployment. NHTSA continues to closely monitor real-world SAB deployments involving both children and adults.

As for the regret issue, I hear you, however I've always been more likely not to just follow directions to have a clean conscience, but to look into the core of the issue. I started looking into this because I was surprised to hear that airbags couldn't help in accident (which btw in many cases they have...)

My initial findings were that most of the fear quoted was from a study done 13 years ago, and another even before that.

One is here: www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/womens/chap29.pdf. You will notice in here that the study admits "the vast majority of injuries have been minor..." and that "success stories where airbags saved lives were not included..." If you read the study in depth, you will see in this particular study that majority of problems were from rear-facing carseats. Virtually all crashes were in early-mid 90's cars as well.

This is what started to bother me - I can't find any study out there that has been done recently on the newer airbags and the tidbits I have found show that there has not been an issue - and no study period weighs in the positives. Even if 20 kids who were not seatbelted got injured in a year, how many (20 or more?) who were seatbelted were saved?

Everything I can find quotes over a decade old government study with a very small dataset and only looks at the negatives - not exactly the right approach IMHO.

But it is the government - they have to be right.... right?

11-30-2011, 05:53 AM	#11
Daylorb Registered User Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: Austin Posts: 22	On side airbags: As of 2008, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has investigated over 1,500 crashes where SABs deployed. Sixty of the crashes involved children (ages 13 and under). NHTSA has reported only one child who has been injured by a side airbag; a 3-year old sitting unrestrained in the front seat (of course you wouldn't let your 3-yr-old ride in the front seat, let alone unrestrained!) who sustained minor facial skin lacerations from the side airbag cover. No children are known to have been seriously or fatally injured by a side airbag. A recent study of children in side-impact crashes found no increased risk of injury to children age 15 and younger associated with side airbag deployment. NHTSA continues to closely monitor real-world SAB deployments involving both children and adults. As for the regret issue, I hear you, however I've always been more likely not to just follow directions to have a clean conscience, but to look into the core of the issue. I started looking into this because I was surprised to hear that airbags couldn't help in accident (which btw in many cases they have...) My initial findings were that most of the fear quoted was from a study done 13 years ago, and another even before that. One is here: www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/womens/chap29.pdf. You will notice in here that the study admits "the vast majority of injuries have been minor..." and that "success stories where airbags saved lives were not included..." If you read the study in depth, you will see in this particular study that majority of problems were from rear-facing carseats. Virtually all crashes were in early-mid 90's cars as well. This is what started to bother me - I can't find any study out there that has been done recently on the newer airbags and the tidbits I have found show that there has not been an issue - and no study period weighs in the positives. Even if 20 kids who were not seatbelted got injured in a year, how many (20 or more?) who were seatbelted were saved? Everything I can find quotes over a decade old government study with a very small dataset and only looks at the negatives - not exactly the right approach IMHO. But it is the government - they have to be right.... right?