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| An eye on the weather: Dr Sarah Brewer, aware of the dangers of hypothermia, watches out for an approaching cold front. And is there a tsetse fly lurking nearby? Photo: ANDREW CROWLEY |
By Dr Sarah Brewer
7:00AM GMT 12 Nov 2011
4 Comments
Despite billions invested in medical research, the mortality rate remains constant at 100 per cent. There is no cure. Good health is just the slowest possible route to getting there. In the Western world we are conditioned to think of death in terms of the big five: heart attack, stroke, cancer, pneumonia and respiratory failure. Once you start travelling, however, you encounter a smorgasbord of new ways to die. That’s why I love hypochondriacs – especially those who’ve recently visited foreign parts. They offer a treasure‑trove of unusual symptoms and signs, among which could lurk a case of leishmaniasis, Chagas’ disease, sleeping sickness or even the plague. Here are my top tips on how to avoid some of the lesser-known causes of death worldwide.
1 Don’t upset the wildlife
Most animal-related deaths are due to lowly creatures such as the snake (100,000 fatalities a year) and scorpion (5,000). If you encounter an aggressive animal, back away slowly. Don’t run. Eye-to-eye contact should be avoided with some species (bears), but not others (cougars) so research the potential predators you are most likely to meet.
2 Don’t stand downwind of anthrax
Endemic in 60 countries, just one spore of anthrax can initiate infection. When standing downwind of a contaminated site, it’ll take, on average, just two and a half minutes to inhale that single spore when breathing calmly at a rate of 20 breaths per minute. You can also inhale it from infected animal skin rugs and wool. Pulmonary anthrax has a fatality rate of 50 per cent.
3 Find interesting paper to push
If you ever complain of being bored to death, you’re probably right. Research involving civil servants suggests those experiencing a great deal of boredom are twice as likely to succumb to a heart attack or stroke over the next 25 years than those not feeling bored.
4 Avoid poorly preserved foods
Botulinum toxin is one of nature’s most lethal poisons. The term derives from the Latin for ''sausage’’ after a spate of German outbreaks involving, presumably, iffy frankfurters. Other sources include salted or smoked meats, and honey. Death has also occurred after cosmetic use of the purified toxin, cosily known as Botox.
5 Don’t court disastrous love affairs
Broken heart syndrome is known as ''takotsubo’’ cardiomyopathy after the Japanese fishing pots used to trap octopuses. Why? Because acute emotional stress can cause the tip of your left ventricle temporarily to dilate and resemble such a vessel. Although transient, the resulting abnormal heart rhythms are often fatal.
6 Fit a carbon monoxide detector
This colourless, odourless, tasteless gas binds to your red blood cells 200 times more tightly than oxygen, to impart a cherry-red glow. This masks the telltale cyanosis that usually signals lack of oxygen, and fails to alarm those who find you, apparently sleeping peacefully in your bed. An estimated 2 billion people are at risk worldwide.
7 Don’t kiss assassin bugs
Chagas’ disease is spread by insects known as assassin or kissing bugs which feed around a victim’s mouth during sleep. This transmits a parasite that damages the heart. Ten million people are infected, mostly in the Americas, with 10,000 dying annually as a result. Avoid camping in hostels and mud huts in endemic areas.
8 Pack a hand sanitiser
Diarrhoea – the most common health problem to afflict the Brit abroad – causes 2.2 million deaths every year, mostly in the under fives. When travelling, drink only bottled water from reputable sources, use hand sanitisers and ensure you are fully vaccinated.
9 Eat fibre — but not too much, nor too little
A constipated bowel can twist on itself to cause a lethal intestinal blockage. Volvulus is common if you eat a low-fibre diet or, paradoxically, a high-fibre diet which excessively loads the colon. You have a 1 in 8 chance of becoming constipated and a 1 in 4 chance of inheriting a gut that’s mobile enough to twist. If you visit the Andes, your risk increases 50-fold as low atmospheric pressure encourages intestinal gases to inflate.
10 Don’t forget your parachute
Your risk of death each time you go base jumping is 1 in 2,300. But everyday sports attract their own mortality rate. The odds of dying during table tennis, for example, are 250,600 to 1. Interestingly, a systematic review published in the British Medical Journal suggests our reliance on parachutes is based solely on anecdotal evidence. No rigorous, randomised, placebo-controlled trials have ever been undertaken to prove they reduce the risk of death after gravitational challenge.
11 Stay out of the kitchen
Forty-two per cent of all accidents occur inside the home. The kitchen, with its sharp knives, heat sources and electrical appliances is especially dangerous. In Britain, one in two people experience domestic injuries each year and your risk of dying is 1 in 1,500.
12 Remain occupationally vigilant
If you go to work to escape the dangers of home, think again. Against an annual global toll of 270 million work-related accidents and 160 million work-related illnesses, a total of 2.2 million lives are claimed every year.
13 Watch your step
While it’s possible to fall more than 1,000 metres and live, it’s also relatively common to trip on perfectly flat ground and die. Of the estimated 3,730,000 falls that require medical treatment worldwide each year, 424,000 are fatal.
14 Check your smoke alarm
Victims of fire are more likely to die from smoke inhalation than burns. Super-heated fumes contain toxins such as ammonia and hydrogen cyanide so fit smoke detectors on each floor of your home. Test regularly and replace batteries before they run out.
15 Point your gun in a safe direction
Firearms are the weapon of choice in 360,000 homicides and 330,000 suicides worldwide each year, but one in five gunshot wounds is accidental.
16 Stay cool…
More than 35,000 people die from heat stroke every year. If global warming is a real phenomenon, then excessive heat will become an increasingly common cause of death.
17 …but not too cold
Hypothermia contributes to more than 30,000 deaths in Britain each year. Older people are more sensitive to falling temperature but less likely to register they’re cold. Wear layers of warm clothing, use extra blankets during winter nights and check on the frail or elderly living alone.
18 Choose your doctor carefully
Medical errors affect one in 10 patients, allegedly. Most are non-lethal but if you’re taken into hospital there’s at least a 1 in 100 chance your physician will hasten your demise. With some notable exceptions, most mistakes are accidental rather than deliberate.
19 Avoid sneezers
Seasonal influenza kills 1 in 1,000 of those infected, typically the very young, very old and those with pre-existing health problems. Avoid people with cold-like symptoms, wash hands regularly and accept a flu vaccination if you’re at risk of complications.
20 Steer clear of other road users
The ''infernal’’ combustion engine causes 3,560 deaths on the world’s roads every day. This annual toll will almost double to 2.4 million by 2030 and become the fifth leading cause of death. If walking at night, carry a torch and wear high- visibility clothing. Drive defensively – assume all other road users are idiots and you won’t be far wrong.
21 Say no to sandflies
Leishmaniasis is a parasite that threatens 350 million people in 88 countries. Spread by sandflies (which breed in trees, caves, old buildings and rubbish tips), it kills up to 200,000 people a year by invading their liver. Eight times this number experience disfiguring skin ulcers and facial distortions instead.
22 Take all your antimalarials
Half the world’s population is at risk of malaria, a parasite transmitted by the mosquito. Malaria is endemic in 106 countries, and kills one million people a year, yet few finish their antimalarials after coming home. Obtain up-to-date prophylaxis information before travelling, and practise bite avoidance.
23 Vaccinate against measles
Those who enjoy access to free immunisation forget that measles is a killer. More than 20 million people catch measles every year, with 164,000 deaths – almost one every three minutes.
24 Select your fruit and veg carefully
Plants are just as deadly as animals but tend to lure you into eating them rather than the other way round. Some fungi only effect the immunosuppressed, but plants such as sea mango, yellow oleander and birdlime thistle kill even the healthy with just a few mouthfuls.
25 Don’t pet strange carnivores
An estimated 3.3 billion people live with a significant risk of encountering rabies which kills more than 55,000 people a year. Dogs transmit 99 per cent of human cases – we are instinctively drawn to man’s best friend.
26 Assess your home’s radon levels
Radioactive radon gas forms as uranium decays in the rocks, soil, bricks and concrete around us. Radon seeps into our homes to cause 1 in 10 lung cancers. If readings are high, fit special ventilators and sumps.
27 Keep wounds clean
Sepsis is the second leading cause of death in non-heart patients worldwide. Although the slightest scratch can become infected, most cases follow medical interventions and surgery. An estimated 20 million cases occur each year but less than 2 million are documented. With intensive care, the mortality rate starts at 35 per cent, rising to 60 per cent when shock (low blood pressure) is present.
28 Avoid tsetse flies
Sleeping sickness is one of the world’s most deadly infections. Related to Chagas’ disease and leishmaniasis, the causative parasite is transmitted by tsetse flies in rural Africa, killing 50,000 people per year.
29 Choose your surgeon carefully
The risk of dying during general anaesthesia averages 1 in 200,000. Add in surgery and the mortality rate climbs to 1 in 125. The World Health Organisation recently implemented a Surgical Safety Checklist to reduce the risk of complications, including death, by a third. How? By verifying basic things such as the patient’s name and allergies, anticipating blood loss and documenting how many instruments, sponges or needles are used. Little things make a big difference.
30 Stay in bed on Mondays during winter
The diurnal rhythms which influence blood pressure, heart rate and brain activity mean you are three times less likely to die during the night than the morning. Only 11 per cent of deaths occur between midnight and 8am. You are also 18 per cent more likely to die on a Monday than a Sunday (due to the stress of returning to work) and 25 per cent more likely to die during winter than in summer.
Reaper madness: five crazy ways to go
Nasa states that ''No human in the past 1,000 years is known to have been killed by a meteorite or by the effects of one impacting.’’
Ice blocks falling from the sky killed five people in St Petersburg in 2010 — Russia’s coldest winter for 30 years.
In the 14th century, plague (spread by rat fleas) felled one in three of the world’s population. Today, it still causes 200 deaths a year.
24,000 people fall victim to lightning each year. Equatorial Africa is most affected — on one occasion all 11 members of a football team were killed by a single bolt of lightning. The opposing team were uninjured.
Intestinal worms infest more than 2 billion people, contributing to 300,000 deaths a year.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/wellbeing/8881881/30-ways-to-live-longer.html
