Letters as that submitted by Jean Soler (‘Cycling and mortality’, December 6) continue to confirm that the question of speed and road safety is an emotionally charged subject which obscures scientific objectivity. Soler resorted to petulant comments on a previously published article (‘Unhealthy car dependency’, November 30). Yet, there is abundant evidence showing the danger of excessive speeds. In 2004, the Institute of Transport Economics published a report on the relationship between traffic speed and injury or fatality, a meta-analysis based on the results of no fewer than 175 scientific reports. It showed a strong statistical association between speed and road safety, concluding there was no other risk factor with a more powerful impact on accidents or injuries than speed. It clearly resulted that if speed goes down so do road deaths or injuries.

In 2010, the UK Faculty of Public Health and the Royal Society for Public Health submitted a 12-point plan deemed to save many lives and relieve pressure on the NHS. The plan had also included a speed limit of 32 km/h (20 miles per hour ) in built-up areas.

Item 54, of ‘Motion for a European Parliamentary Resolution’ (adopted by the EU in September 2011) “…strongly recommends responsible authorities to introduce speed limits of 30 km/h in residential areas and on all one-lane roads in urban areas which have no separate cycle lane, with a view to protecting vulnerable road users”.

That Soler drove ‘safely’ along roads in the UK and Northern Ireland at high speeds doesn’t prove anything scientifically beyond the possibility that he probably broke the speed limit.