This March, during Brain Injury Awareness Month, it’s time for South Carolina to take initiative on driving laws to protect the brains of the future.

Brain injury is one of the leading causes of death and disability in America. Every function, thought and move initiates from the human brain. If it is such a vital part to the human body, why does the State of South Carolina not do more to protect it on the road?

Highway safety numbers are not in the state’s favor. The state had 950 highway fatalities in 2015. The SC Department of Transportation reported this total as the highest since 2007. Of 950 fatalities, 132 were motorcycle drivers, the highest amount in history.

Citizens should push for a bill to change from a partial helmet law to a universal law, forcing every motorcyclist to wear a helmet.

You might think such a stringent law is unconstitutional or an attack on the rights of individuals. A little history lesson and common sense say otherwise. In 1980 South Carolina had a universal helmet law, but changed it to the current law that says anyone under age 20 is legally required to wear a helmet on a motorcycle. But why 20? And what about the safety of everyone over the age of 20? As the human brain does not stop fully developing until age 25 and is sort of important, why don’t we raise it to 25? Or better yet, preserve even mature brains with a universal helmet law.

Of the 950 motorcycle fatalities, 83 percent were not wearing a helmet. The South Carolina Crash Outcome Data Evaluation System analysis for 2008 showed that motorcycle helmets reduce the risk of dying in a motorcycle crash by 37 percent. Riders wearing helmets are 71 percent less likely to incur a traumatic brain injury than riders not wearing helmets. With such compelling numbers, what stops a motorcyclist from wearing a helmet?

I imagine it’s the feeling of know-how, freedom and invincibility that a motorcycle gives. I love that distinctive American impulse. So let’s look at each.

First, crashes are rarely avoided by good driving skills alone. Often, multiple factors that are out of the rider’s control attribute to the crash. And in a blink of an eye, traumatic brain injuries completely alter not only the rider’s future, but also the future of the people around them.

Second, freedom still happens under a hat. Just ask any founding father or Trump supporter today!

Third, living with a brain injury diminishes independence and power. Simple tasks are made significantly more difficult. People who suffer from traumatic brain injury require a support system to be put in place around them, just to contend with daily care needs. CDC data shows that riders who do not wear a helmet and suffer injury have 13 times higher hospital costs than someone who was in a motorcycle accident wearing a helmet, with most of those costs falling to taxpayers. Riders without helmets could be the “poster child” of the contemporary welfare recipient.

Pushing for a change in legislation for the State of South Carolina is a move in the right direction for future generations to come.

Florida is an example of why universal helmet laws save lives and money. In 2000 Florida changed from a universal helmet law to a partial helmet law, copying what South Carolina had done in 1980. During the two-year time span since the law was changed, the motorcyclist death rate increased by 21 percent, deaths among motorcycle riders under 21 years nearly tripled, and hospital admissions of motorcyclists with injuries to the head, brain, and skull increased by 82 percent.

Meanwhile, states with universal helmet laws have the lowest percentage of deaths from motorcycle accidents.

Let’s make sure a bill for this change gets its public support this March and can become law for next March, so we can celebrate what Brain Injury Awareness month did for South Carolina.

Simone Corpora is a junior communications major at Furman University.

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