Relative Injury Risk of E-bikes and Conventional Bicycles

Electric bicycles are increasingly promoted as part of sustainable urban mobility, yet concerns remain that they may entail higher injury risk than conventional bicycles. This study combines emergency ward injury data from Oslo, Norway, for 2023 with distance-based exposure estimates from the Norwegian National Travel Behaviour Survey to calculate distance-adjusted injury risk. The analysis includes 1,585 cyclist injuries requiring medical treatment. Overall, injury risk was lower for e-bikes than for conventional bicycles. Seasonal variation was considerable, and the reduced risk associated with e-bikes was not evident in winter.