What are you afraid of? Clowns; spiders; the dark? These little phobias can spook us every once in a while, but in reality, they don’t actually pose any true danger. But, there are things that do.
While you can do a pretty good job of avoiding clowns, these everyday objects are pretty hard to dodge. That, and they’re known to cause death and injury to people every year. Even if the chances of being seriously hurt or killed by any of these things are relatively low, you’ll be hard-pressed to walk into a room from now on without being slightly paranoid.
1. Toothpicks are a serious choking hazard, causing about 9,000 injuries per year.
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2. Candles cause 15,000 house fires each year.
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3. Think you’re safe in a building during a lightening storm? If it strikes the structure, it can travel through TV and radio antennae, electrical systems, and phone lines.
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4. There are some butterflies that actually suck blood.
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5. According to a study by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, 16% of cell phones have fecal matter on them.
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6. Fruit punch and strawberry yogurt are often dyed red with carmine, a compound that is made from ground-up beetles.
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7. Statistics from 1998 show that more fast food employees were murdered while working than police officers. Today, four to five fast food employees are killed on the job every month.
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8. Those innocent looking stairs you take every day are linked to the deaths of 12,000 people ever year.
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9. Elevators, while safer than the stairs, cause an average of 27 deaths yearly.
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10. Over the course of a decade, most mattresses double in weight…because of dust mites and their poop.
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11. The air you breathe in a typical metro station is about 15% human skin.
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12. In the U.S., 6,000 people die because of texting while driving.
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13. If you think your toilet is dirty, think again. Your office desk has 400 times more bacteria than that porcelain throne.
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14. Each year, 1,700 men are sent to the ER because of…zipper-related injuries.
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15. The cold in Russia is no joke. Icicles kill 100 people every year.
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16. You’re 25 times more likely to die in your bathtub than you are to be killed by a terrorist.
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17. Many shampoos and other cosmetic products contain cancer-causing carcinogens.
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18. The Amazonian candiru fish has been known to swim up urine streams, using their barbs to attach itself inside the urethra. Terrifying.
19. TV is killing you. Watching TV every day for more than two hours shortens your life span by nearly 1.5 years.
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20. Fore! Golf clubs have reportedly killed four people after being tossed, breaking, springing back, and stabbing the golfer in the heart.
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21. Under that ring on your finger could be as many as 730 million germs. Wash your hands – jeez!
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22. If you sneeze too hard can break a rib, but don’t try to hold it in, either! Doing so can pop a blood vessel in your head.
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23. There can be up to 150 bug fragments and five rodent hairs in one pound of peanut butter.
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24. Swans are majestic, but they can also get pretty violent when they feel threatened. Among other things, they’ve capsized boats and strangled dogs to death.
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25. Annually, 600 people die simply because they fell out of bed.
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(via List25)
I don’t know if you’re freaked out, but I certainly am. Basically, I’m never going outside again and plan on living in a bubble…just kidding (kind of).