What’s dangerous in everyday life?

It appears to be a no-brainer. A shark is definitely deadlier than a bee, right? While a bee can sting you, the terrifying jaws of a shark can slice through your bones and eat you alive. Also, you can squash a little bitty bee with your newspaper, but you have little defense against a 20-foot shark underwater.

But it turns out that I am mistaken. Statistics show that a bee is much deadlier than a shark. Fred Kilbourne, an actuary with The Kilbourne Company in San Diego, says that you are 50 times more likely to be killed by a bee than a shark. Who knew!

Kilbourne made some other calculations that caught my eye. They are:

• Lighting is more dangerous than hail. On average, lighting has killed 42 people in the United States every year for the past 10 years. The last known fatality from hail was in 1979.
• The most dangerous occupation in the country is that of President of the United States. Nine percent of our presidents have been assassinated.
• Swimming pools are more dangerous than trampolines. More than 1,000 Americans die each year in swimming pools. Trampolines send nearly 100,000 people to the emergency room each year but cause very few fatalities.
• You are more likely to be killed by the bubonic plaque than by a mountain lion.

For more interesting calculations, Here’s a list of what’s more dangerous.