Every time someone jumps out of a plane for charity and something goes wrong, the NHS shells out – on average – more than £4,000 treating jumpers’ broken bones. And that doesn't include the cost of time off work, or damage to injured jumpers' quality of life. At least, that’s what some pretty compelling research has shown. The amount raised for charity is piffling in comparison.

So why do charities persist in flogging this dangerous, expensive, and generally harmful activity?

There are, I think, three possibilities:

1. Charities don't know how silly skydiving is. I think this is the most likely explanation. It’s a poor excuse. Just tap in ‘parachute charity cost’ into Google Scholar. Not hard.
2. Charities don't care about the cost to the NHS. This is less likely. But fundraisers work under enormous pressure – so the chance of some stressed-out employee accidentally-on-purpose ignoring the safety stats can’t be entirely discounted.
3. The research is wrong. Again, this is a possibility – though it looks to me to be a slim one. The two studies I’ve linked to above both include some pretty large samples, taken over a few years. And there doesn’t seem to be much disagreement with them either (unless I’ve missed something, that is).

Charities should stop offering skydives – or they should put much more effort into explaining why they offer them. At the moment, skydiving looks more irresponsible than charitable. Charities should explain why they think differently.
 

 

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