EACH YEAR around this time Feedback’s favourite government report
appears—the Home and Leisure Accident Surveillance System report
from Britain’s Department of Trade and Industry. It gives figures for accidents
reported by people admitted to a sample group of British hospitals and then
gives extrapolated estimates for the country as a whole.
First the bad news in this year’s report, which is based on 1999 data: the
toll of accidents caused by tea cosies is up again, with a national estimate of
37 tea cosy injuries, compared with 20 the previous year. Equally alarming, the
number of accidents caused by place mats—a menace we have paid too little
attention to in the past—is up from 157 to 165 across the country as a
whole.
These worrying figures are somewhat balanced by a welcome decline in another
area of concern—sponge and loofah accidents. The shocking previous total
of 996 nationwide is now down to 787.
Advertisement
But the major causes of concern are still with us. The number of people
hospitalised after a trouser accident (up from 5137 to 5945) is worryingly high,
while the drop in injuries inflicted by armchairs (down from 18,690 to 16,662)
leaves little room for complacency. Hospitalisations caused by socks and tights
have also risen (10,773 compared to 9843 previously), while injuries inflicted
by vegetables remain unacceptably high at 13,132 compared with the previous
year’s 12,362.
The number of accidents involving tree trunks has also risen from 1777 to
1810, while leaf accidents have soared from 664 to 1171, with a similar increase
in bird-bath accidents from 117 to 311.
Many people will also be shocked by the number of accidents caused by
beanbags, which has risen from 957 to 1317. The seriousness of this menace
becomes clear when measured against the 329 injuries caused by meat cleavers or
the 439 caused by rat or mouse poison.
In fact, the report makes it clearer than ever that our homes are full of
unacknowledged dangers. It identifies 3421 people nationwide as having been
injured by clothes baskets, while other threats include dust pans (146
injuries), bread bins (91), talcum powder (73), toilet-roll holders (329), clogs
(622), false teeth (933) and wellington boots (5615).
As in the past, printed magazines like 91av caused far more
injuries than chainsaws—4371 compared with 1207.
So remember—you can’t be too careful.
PIZZA HUT can claim a fast food first—the first pizza delivered to the
International Space Station and eaten by astronauts.
The company says its food scientists teamed up with Russian specialists in a
year-long development and testing programme. They couldn’t deliver the pizza
piping hot—the Soyuz Pizza Hut delivery rocket takes too long to reach the
space station. And the station crew had to settle for a miniature 15-centimetre
pizza because a full-size one wouldn’t fit into their on-board oven. They also
had to settle for salami rather than pepperoni, which didn’t pass the testing
programme. But it was pizza.
The pizza rode to the station with space tourist Dennis Tito, inspiring the
editors of the NASA Watch website (www.nasawatch.com) to muse: “What a success
story: a self-made American multimillionaire, born to a working class family,
pays $20 million to fly on a Russian spacecraft and ends up as a pizza
delivery boy.”
AND HOT on the heels of the first space tourist, it seems NASA is planning
hiking tours on the Red Planet
(http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast24may_1.htm). Having just released
new high-resolution images of the famous “Face on Mars” rock feature, the space
agency has put together a trail map that will guide you to the top of this
Martian mesa.
The new images reveal the Face to be nothing more than an average flat-topped
mountain, despite what ET watchers had been hoping since it was spotted by
Viking 1 some 25 years ago. According to Jim Garvin, chief scientist for NASA’s
Mars Exploration Program, the climb to the top is easy at the start, but there
are some steep sections further up.
The hike itself is about 5.5 kilometres each way, and takes you 300 metres
above the Martian plains. Garvin suggests that hikers take plenty of water and
oxygen, implying that walking conditions on Mars can be tough. But at least
there is little chance of the trail being closed because of an outbreak of foot
and mouth disease.
FROM the department of superfluous precision: in the lead-up to this week’s
British general election, the official Labour Party website had this in its
section on Cambridge: “The Tories would axe the New Deal and all Labour’s
measures to help people off benefit and into work that have seen unemployment
fall by 1,047 (or 49.6679316888046 per cent) in Cambridge since May 1997.”
Were they afraid that if they rounded off the figure they would be accused of
massaging the statistics?
ᷡ鷡’S one of those papers you want to read just to find out what the title
means. It’s from Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise (vol 33, p 612),
and it’s called “Muscle function at the wrist after eccentric exercise”.
READER Ian Patient reports that the vegetables he bought from his local
Waitrose supermarket were labelled “Trimmed Mange-tout”.
In a similar vein, the coffee he bought said on the jar: “Nescafe Gold
Decaffeinated. Deny yourself nothing.”
QUICHES sold by the CO-OP bear these two sentences on their packaging: “This
product is fully cooked and may be eaten hot or cold. Ensure food is piping hot
before serving”
FINALLY, on the front page of Electronics Weekly (16 May)
there is a picture
of Britain’s energy minister Peter Hain opening a roof of solar panels on top of
some offices. The caption goes on to say: “It [the solar panel array] will be
used to supply solar systems to around 300 homes.”
How useful.