Give a Vietnamese child a helmet; save a life

After helmets are donated: following up with student and teacher crash cases

During August and September we revisited 32 Helmets for Kids project schools in the Ha Tinh, Dong Nai, and Quang Binh provinces of Vietnam to check on helmet use rates follow-up with road safety education. During these visits, we were told of 30 incidents of students (and 1 teacher) of project schools being involved in traffic crashes. In all 30 crashes there was not a single head injury- every individual walked away from the scene thanks to the helmet they received as a donation.  

As much as we love children’s excitement and joy at receiving helmet donations, seeing them continue to wear their helmets throughout the year and learning about instances that these helmets saved their lives never fails to move us.

Here are a few of their stories:

On September 14^th, fourth grader Pham Minh Thuan was riding on a motorcycle with his sister near their home when another motorcyclist collided into them and they fell into the street.  Thuan sustained some scratches on his arm but no head injury thanks to the helmet he received as a donation. 

On August 26^th, third grader Nguyen Thi Thuy Dung was riding her bicycle to school when she collided with another bicyclist and fell down onto the sidewalk. Her head hit the pavement but she was not seriously injured because she was wearing the helmet she received as a donation. Dung walked away from the accident with a few scratches and made it to school.

Second grader Phan Thi Khanh Linh was riding home from the park by motorcycle with her mother. A dog ran into their path and they were unable to avoid it. Linh fell off of the motorcycle and sprained her ankle. Thanks to the helmet she was wearing, she did not sustain a serious injury.

This July, Nguyen Thanh Huong, teacher at So 1 Thach Ha primary school in Ha Tinh, was travelling home to her village when she collided with a motorcyclist driving the wrong way down a one-way street. She fell from her motorcycle with such force that the hard shell of her helmet was broken. The helmet she received as a donation absorbed the full impact of the collision, and she walked away from the crash with only a few scratches on her arm.

These are just a few stories we collected. The helmets we donate always come with a lesson in traffic safety, and we hope that these lessons prevent most of our target population from even being involved in crashes to begin with.

In addition to providing helmets to students and teachers, we are expanding to donate helmets to as many mothers as we can.