Dude. It’s research. It was a question. An academic decided to research it. That’s WHAT THEY DO. It is their reason for existing to experiment on anything and everything. And, it is a completely valid question, and a completely reasonable thing to study, and publishing the results is entirely expected and required. That is not some “malicious act”. It isn’t an “attack on your safety”. It’s a freaking study. It’s his job to study things and publish the results.
Yeah, people should wear helmets. No, helmets won’t make you safe. They help reduce a certain subset of injury, a common and important subset but a subset nonetheless.
However, a lot of people seem to invest magical powers into them; just witness the television ads urging people to wear bicycle helmets so that they won’t get broken arms. They don’t solve the root problems. They won’t help you if you are hit by a car; they won’t help you when you land on your hands, they won’t help you in a lot of cases. The cases they help are really important, sure, but that doesn’t mean you can say “I’m wearing a helmet, i’m safe now”.