Emergency doctors set to call for import ban on non-road-legal vehicles

The Government should ban the importation and sale of non-road-legal vehicles such as scramblers and quad bikes, top emergency doctors will tell the Oireachtas justice committee on Tuesday.Two consultants in emergency medicine and trauma at the Mater hospital in Dublin will present to the committee on the use of scrambler bikes and e-scooters and the impact on public safety. Dr Luke Philips will tell the committee that between January 2021 and June of this year, four road users died and 59 were seriously injured in collisions involving a scrambler – with two of the deaths and 15 of the injuries occurring among those who were not riding the vehicle. All the scrambler riders killed or injured were male, and three-quarters were aged 25 or younger.READ MORE“These riders are exposed, travelling at high speeds in urban environments. They often have little or no protective equipment,” Philips will say, with the most commonly seen injury being fractured limbs.“But we are also seeing spinal injuries, solid organ injuries to the spleen and liver, and severe traumatic brain injury needing neurosurgical referral.”He will say that the picture with e-scooters is similar, with presentations steadily rising in his hospital over two years – again, significant limb injuries are most commonly seen, “with many requiring trips to theatre and placing an ever-increasing burden on our ED and inpatient units”.He will tell the committee that he and his medical colleagues welcome the introduction of Grace’s Law - the legislation explicitly banning the use of scramblers and quad bikes in all public places, named after 16-year-old Grace Lynch, who died after being struck by a scrambler near her Finglas home in January. “We think this should be extended to banning the import and sale of non-road-legal machines, mandatory vehicle registration, and real enforcement of the rules of the road, existing age limits and use of protective equipment,” he will say.