A TOP consultant has warned that in just over a year the amount of children sustaining brain injuries from incidents involving e-scooters has spiked dramatically. 

Dr Irwin Gill, who is a consultant in Neurodisability at CHI Temple Street, today said that since legislation came into force in May 2024 regulating the use of e-scooters there has been somewhere in the region of ten incidents involving e-scooters wherein children were injured so badly that they had to be admitted to hospital under the care of neurosurgery and rehabilitation teams. 

Temple Street is Ireland’s national neurosurgical center, and the teams there are now highly concerned about an extended spike in admissions of children “of children who have been injured because of falls from e-scooters”, according to Dr Gill. 

Speaking on Today with Claire Byrne this morning, he said that staff in Temple Street are “beginning to lose track” of the cases as they are so numerous.

He added that since the new legislation came into play surrounding e-scooters in May of last year the team in Temple Street have seen “approximately 20 [children]“. 

“That’s just the ones admitted who needed to stay in hospital under neurosurgery and rehabilitation. 

“There are many, many more children who are admitted with other injuries; broken bones  and lacerations and other things that are also serious,” Dr Gill expanded. 

He said that half of the cohort have had to have neurosurgery, and that many children have left hospital with “new disabilities that may be persistent and in some cases potentially lifelong”. 

Dr Gill said that the parents he meets are often unaware that there is an age limit of 16 for e-scooters, and he said that in almost all of the incidents that have led to the injuries of children he’s treated, they were not wearing a helmet at the time. 

He said that while wearing a helmet would have helped in some cases, it would not have prevented all of the injuries resulting from e-scooter related incidents that the hospital has seen in the last year. 

He said that some children are losing control because the bike is going too fast, and that some are falling off, colliding with walls, or colliding with other children on e-scooters. 

“We’ve had people hit parked cars, but a very small number have been hit by cars that were actually moving,” the doctor said. 

He said that there have also been incidents wherein children were ‘doubling’ and riding an e-scooter with two people at the one time on board, which is banned under the legislation that came into effect to regulate their use last year.

“I think it needs to be made clearer what the law is and what the expectations are. Because, as I said I do think that it’s a lack of awareness in the parents that we meet about the law, it’s not just people deciding that they know better,” he said. 

Dr Gill said a group of physicians is now planning to contact politicians and the Road Safety Authority in the coming days with more data to pass on to them.

He said that he believes we are currently not doing enough in terms of public policy to keep children who are using e-scooters safe.

Dr Gill said that while the legal speed limit for e-scooters is 20 kilometres per hour, Temple Street medics have treated children who were involved in incidents that involved children travelling at much higher speed.