Comment on Open thread, Nov. 17 - Nov. 23, 2014

Adele Lopez
Mon, 17 Nov 2014 22:54:59 GMT

According to the CDC, the leading causes for death for children aged 5-9 (in 2012 in the United States) are:

1. Unintentional injury

2. Malignant neoplasm (aka cancer)

3. Congenital disorders

4. Homicide

5. Heart disease

If we solved aging, it seems likely we could eliminate or significantly reduce deaths from cancer, congenital disorders and heart disease.

Once we look at the 10-14 age bracket or above, suicide makes it into the top five causes of death until age ~50 and above.

We can also look at the leading causes of unintentional injury. For the 5-9 age bracket, we have

1. Motor vehicle accidents

2. Drowning

3. Fire/Burns

4. Unintentional suffocation

5. Other land transport injuries

Traffic accidents seem likely to be solvable to a large degree with self-driving car technology. Not as sure about the others. It's worth noting that the primary cause of unintentional injury deaths for adults is unintentional poisoning. This was surprising to me; I would guess it's mostly due to drug use.

Discuss