In making your decision, consider the following eight points.

The Honourable Leona Aglukkaq, Minister of Health, together with the Canadian Standards Association (CSA), today announced the availability of a new CSA standard for recreational skiing and snowboarding helmets, as well as the establishment of an accompanying CSA certification program.

Health Canada and Canadian Standards Association Announce New Standard for Snow Sport Helmets

Canada’s first alpine helmet standard helps make skiing, snowboarding and tobogganing safer

A risk of serious head injury exists for individuals who do not wear a helmet while participating in recreational snow sports such as skiing and snowboarding. Currently, helmets for use in these sports are not regulated in Canada.

Given that serious head injuries are associated with downhill skiing and snowboarding, it is the intention of Health Canada to introduce legislation, under the Hazardous Products Act, regarding the advertisement, sale and importation of ski and snowboarding helmets in Canada. This will ensure the safest helmet technology is available to Canadians.

How to Get Involved
This consultation is open for comment starting March 24th, 2009 until June 1st, 2009. Once you select the link for the consultation document, you will be able to read through the background and considerations, and submit your comments via email, by fax or in writing to:

Email: M&E@hc-sc.gc.ca

Canada Post:
Ski and Snowboarding Helmet Consultation
Mechanical & Electrical Hazards Division
Consumer Product Safety Bureau
Health Canada
123 Slater Street, 4th floor, AL: 3504D
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0K9

Fax: (613) 952-9138

CTV.ca News Staff

While more Canadians are choosing to wear helmets while skiing or snowboarding, there have been no requirements about how well those helmets should work.

That could change with the country’s first recreational alpine skiing and snowboarding helmet standard. The Canadian Standards Association (CSA) announced Monday it will begin providing testing for certification of the head gear starting next month.

John Walter, vice-president of standards for the non-profit CSA, says the increasing number of head injuries suggested there was a need to develop a standard specifically designed for the Canadian market.
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Congratulations to the CSA
The Brain Injury Association of Canada lauds the Canadian Standards Association in the development of recreational alpine skiing and snowboarding helmet standard to to help protect winter sports enthusiasts on Canadian slopes

The next step is to have the government approve Bill C-289 which will require the recreational alpine skiing and snowboarding helmet industry to follow the CSA standard in the same way as is required for hockey and lacrosse helmets in Canada.

Canada’s first Alpine Helmet standard helps make skiing, snowboarding and tobogganing safer!
Toronto, March 24, 2009 – Each year, hundreds of preventable head injuries are reported on Canadian ski, snowboard and toboggan hills.1 Canadian Standards Association (CSA), a leading developer of standards and codes, announces the country’s first recreational alpine skiing and snowboarding helmet standard to help protect winter sports enthusiasts on Canadian slopes.
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News from the CSA

By Sarah Schmidt, Canwest News Service

OTTAWA — An international group of scientists is calling on Canada and other countries to bring in tougher safety standards for cellphone use after a Swedish team found a fivefold elevated risk of malignant brain tumours in children who begin using mobile phones before the age of 20.

The plea — and the science underlying it — is published in the forthcoming edition of Pathophysiology, devoted to peer-reviewed research about the biological effects of the global explosion of wireless technologies and devices like cellphones, cordless phones, wireless Internet and cell towers.

The findings of 15 studies from health researchers in six different countries, looking at the effects of electromagnetic fields and radio frequency radiation on living cells and on the health of humans, should jolt government agencies into action as a precautionary measure, Dr. David Carpenter, director of the Institute for Health & the Environment at the University at Albany, and one of the co-authors, said in an interview.
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New Documentary About Traumatic Brain Injury & Art to be Presented at the International Festival of Films on Art in Montréal on Saturday, March 28, 2009.

CHANGING IDENTITIES: A STORY OF TRAUMATIC INJURY AND ART, an award-winning documentary film narrated by Meryl Streep, will be presented at the 27th International Festival of Films on Art (FIFA). The festival will take place from March 19 – 29, 2009 in Montréal, Canada. CHANGING IDENTITIES will play on Saturday, March 28th at 1:30pm (EST) and will be followed by a Q&A discussion with the filmmaker, Daniel Labbato.

CHANGING IDENTITIES: A STORY OF TRAUMATIC INJURY AND ART profiles a studio program in upstate New York that doesn’t see art just as a form of therapy, but as a means for participants to redefine who they are, and begin to see themselves not as people with disabilities but as artists. For more info on the film visit: http://fanlight.com/catalog/films/476_ci.php

The International Festival of Films on Art (FIFA) aims to increase public awareness, knowledge and appreciation of the arts by promoting works by artists and professionals from the fields of film, television and video. The festival takes place at several venues around Montreal, including the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Museum of Contemporary Art, Center for Canadian Architecture, Place des Arts, and the Goethe-Institute and more.

Tickets are available at Place des Arts, 175, rue Sainte-Catherine Ouest in Montreal. Student, Senior and Group rates are available. www.pda.qc.ca, 514-842-2112, (toll free) 1-866-842-2112

The full festival schedule is available at: www.artfifa.com.

OTTAWA – The Honourable Dr. Hedy Fry, Member of Parliament for Vancouver-Centre and a physician, today urged the Conservative government, after years of delay, to use the powers available to Cabinet through Governor-in-Council to fast-track her Private Members’ Bill on recreational alpine snow sport helmets.

“The recent serious brain injuries on Canada’s ski slopes are tragic reminders that these brain injuries are preventable. A simple stroke of the pen by the Harper Cabinet is all that it takes. The inexplicable failure to do so is nothing short of irresponsible,” said Dr. Fry. “The Canadian Standard Association (CSA) has developed a new standard for recreational alpine snow sport helmets, but Canadians will never get the benefit from it unless the Conservative government takes urgent action.”

Bill C-289 requires all non-CSA approved recreational snow sport helmets to be prohibited under the Hazardous Products Act. While helmets for hockey and lacrosse are regulated under hazardous-products legislation, helmets for sports such as snowboarding and skiing are not. Dr. Fry first introduced her bill in March 2007, but it will not be coming up for debate soon. So while it is supported by the three opposition parties, successive Conservative Health Ministers have failed to fast-track it through Governor-in-Council.

Dr. Fry’s Bill is supported by the Canadian Medical Association, the Alzheimer Society of Canada, the Brain Injury Association of Canada, the Insurance Bureau of Canada, and renowned neurosurgeon Dr. Charles Tator, the founder of ThinkFirst.

“ThinkFirst continues to recommend strongly that the federal government add recreational skiing and snowboarding helmets to the list of items covered by the Hazardous Products Act,” said Dr. Tator.

“Canada ranks 27th out of 29 OECD countries in government investment in youth injury prevention programs,” added Richard Kinar of the Brian Injury Association of Canada. “The Harper government should fast-track Bill C-289, and invest in a national injury prevention strategy for youth in sport.”

Natasha Richardson’s nightmare accident on a Quebec ski slope Tuesday has already generated a new debate about ski helmets.
There’s currently no law in Canada requiring skiers or snowboarders to wear helmets. And the snow-sport helmets now on the market are not required to meet any standard.

The voices raised on this issue each winter, and especially this week, tend to be shouting one of two messages, either “government must make us safe” or “leave us alone.” Quebec’s emergency-room doctors, for example, proposed this month that helmets be made mandatory on the province’s ski slopes. Ski operators, on the other hand, no doubt aware that a few of their customers would rather stay home than wear head-gear, generally take the line that helmet use should be left to individual choice.

With great sympathy for the stricken actress and her family and all accident victims, we think the most sensible position lies in between those two cited above: Governments should not require helmets, but skiers and snowboarders should wear them voluntarily.

The world is packed full of dangers we should know to avoid. It’s a lamentable modern reflex to insist that government has the responsibility to keep each of us safe in every circumstance. Certainly it makes sense for governments to license ski resorts, requiring operators to meet minimum safety standards. But as a practical matter, regulating a few hundred ski hills is different from regulating hundreds of thousands of skiers.

Helmet culture is changing. Once a rarity on Quebec hills, helmeted skiers are now commonplace. This trend comes not from government busybodies ordering us around, but from the slow steady spread of common sense. As with drunk driving, smoking, and other social ills, changes will take effect more rapidly if the impetus comes from the bottom up than from the top down. This can, however, be encouraged by a government education campaign, especially aimed at parents.

Another thing Ottawa really should be doing is imposing minimum standards on anything sold in Canada as a ski helmet. British Columbia Liberal Hedy Fry, who is a medical doctor, has been trying for two years to get such standards enacted into law; the Conservative government has shown no interest. That’s a shame, because people who want head protection should be able to rely on the helmets they buy.

Of course, no helmet will protect us from every crash on the slopes, or from freak accidents. And government, even less, has the power to keep us safe. That responsibility ultimately always rests with individuals.