this post was submitted on 25 Nov 2023
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Science Memes

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[–] [email protected] -5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So 0.6% chance of being a vehicle owner being involved in a fatal accident over a ten year timespan? 0.06% over a single year?

Sounds pretty safe to me.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The injury rate is about 70 times higher though.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

The point I’m trying to make is that absolute risk numbers are far more useful than stating relative risk, especially once we get below the average person’s acceptable risk tolerance. Saying “this country is xx times safer than this country” can be misleading.

For example, if we consider a hypothetical country that has 1 traffic death per 100,000 vehicles you could make the statement that, “the Netherlands has 6x more traffic deaths than hypothetical country!” It would make the Netherlands seem like a dangerous place to live, but I’d wager that the vast majority of people would feel perfectly comfortable with the idea of being in traffic in the Netherlands.