Interesting Facts

Artificial sweetner and sugar substitute, aspartame, which can be found in most diet drinks, including big-name brands such as Diet Coke, was discovered by accident in 1965 by James Schlatter, a chemist at the U.S. drugs company GD Searle (now part of Pfizer). (The legend goes that he was working in his laboratory on a new ulcer drug when he mixed two amino acids, aspartic acid and phenylalanine. After accidentally spilling the liquid on his hand, he licked his finger and found it was sweet. Today, a host of websites with names such as aspartamekills.com and sweetpoison.com warn that it is dangerous to health, and Pepsi recently announced it's dropping the sweetener from drinks in the US but not the UK.) Source

According to the South African government's Road Traffic Management Corporation, South Africa has one of the world’s highest road fatality rates in the world. (The risk of dying in a car accident in South Africa is 28 people per 100,000, compared to just 3.1 in the UK. Even worse is that almost half of RTAs (road traffic accidents) involve young pedestrians, with three children under the age of 15 dying on the roads every day.)

Between 2008 and 2009, 921,840 drivers across Britain admitted crashing because they were distracted by a member of the opposite sex. (According to aA study carried out by Insurance company Direct Line, found 60% of men admitted to being distracted by attractive women whilst driving, and interestingly us ladies aren't completely innocent either; 12% of women said they took their eyes off the road to have an ogle at good looking men.) Time for a song I think:-

According to figures released by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents; more people were killed on UK roads in 2011 than at any time since 2003. (Statistics revealed almost 2,000 people died in traffic accidents – 3% up on 2010. The number of deaths and serious injuries reported to the police hit 25,023, a 2% increase on the previous year and the first increase in those killed or seriously injured since 1994. Now I wonder what's changed recently that might cause these increases. Anyone here been using their mobile phone recently?) Source

In 2010 China reported 3.9 million road accidents that killed 65,225 people and injured 254,075.

In what is probably the most expensive car crash in history, eight Ferraris, three Mercedes-Benzes, a Lamborghini and two other vehicles crashed in the southern prefecture of Yamaguchi, Japan. (Media reports estimate the damaged cars are worth at least 300m yen ($3.85m; £2.46m) in total. The good news is no-one was seriously hurt. As they say in Germany "Es ist nur Blechschaden" (It's only damaged metal).)

According to a report in the American Journal of Public Health, in the period of from 2001 to 2007, an estimated 16,000 people in the US, were killed by drivers who were distracted by talking or texting on mobile phones. (The research also found that a growing number of these drivers were under 30. The problem is everyone thinks it won't happen to them, because they know what they're doing. It's like drink driving - just don't do it.)

According to research carried out by DirectLine for the Daily Mirror, satellite navigation systems are being blamed for 300,000 road accidents each year. (Over 1.5 million drivers said that they had driven badly because they were consulting the devices, either by veering across lanes or making illegal manoeuvres. Might I suggest that if a sat-nav gives you an instruction that is likely to leave you in the middle of a river, or driving the wrong way down a road, ignore it.)

A female driver is three times more likely than a man to suffer whiplash injuries if her car is hit from behind. (Female passengers suffer from whiplash injuries when their car is hit from the front too. Believe me, I know.)

powered by ODEO According to a report in the Daily Mail officials at the Health and Safety Executive are just as prone to accidents as the rest of us. Staff there have been involved in 500 accidents in three years. (One person slipped on a raisin of all things and another cut his head when he walked into a warning sign, which is priceless. I just wonder who investigates these accidents at the place that is supposed to investigate accidents. The Health and Safety, Health and Safety Executive?)