Hell on two wheels
Scooter zig-zagging drives up ER injuries
Angelo Mascia, DO, and Daniel G. Murphy, MD, work in the Department of Emergency Medicine at St. Barnabas Hospital in The Bronx. They write to The Post about the latest increase in business — electric scooters:
THE growing use of private and pay-per-use bicycles in New York City is a worthy and convenient transportation solution that is environmentally friendly. The prevention of injuries and deaths among bicyclists requires ongoing innovation and civil-engineering solutions.
Bicyclists, pedestrians and vehicles should safely coexist.
Our emergency department has noticed a concerning and dangerous transportation trend in The Bronx, however, with the introduction of pay-per-use motorized scooters and mopeds.
The rapidly expanding use of the Revel scooter, a two-person electric scooter with maximum speeds of 43 mph (throttled to 30 mph in NYC), has been associated with a large uptick in visits to our emergency department in the last month. Our patient interviews indicate loose compliance with the mandatory helmet and other common-sense traffic laws among the scooter ridership, resulting in serious injuries to both riders and innocent pedestrians.
Social-media pages are replete with videos showing young people using these scooters while weaving in and out of traffic and driving at high speeds, even on sidewalks.
We have treated everything from bumps and scrapes to dislocated shoulders, broken bones and serious head injuries. We recently received seven victims of separate accidents during one overnight shift.
Easily accessible and affordable transportation in New York City is imperative. As Bronx emergency physicians, we are uncertain that these scooters are a worthy or wise innovation.