Reporting Statistics

Statistics on Motorcycle Accidents and Links for Accident Research

2014-05-30T11:24:00.000-04:00

Motorcycle Safety Awareness Month

May is Motorcycle Safety Awareness Month, and while motor vehicle accidents seem to be decreasing, motorcycle fatalities are a big issue. May is the beginning of warmer weather for many states. The snow melts and it is once again beautiful weather to take the bike out for a nice ride in the countryside or along the ocean. During the winter time you may not have seen many or any motorcyclists, this is why in May we raise awareness to remind drivers of the increase in motorcycles on the road.

A foot was severed on impact during this motorcycle accident which occurred at an intersection.
Photo Credit: Chris Yarzab. Creative Commons License 2.0.

According to the National Highway Safety Administration, from 2011 to 2012 motorcycle fatalities increased from 4.630 to 4,957. Motorcycle Injuries from 2011 to 2012 increased from 81,000 to 93,000. That is a 7% increase in motorcycle fatalities and a 15% increase in motorcycle injuries.

In the Governors Highway Safety Association Report based on preliminary data, Motorcycle Fatalities should have dropped back down to what they were in 2011. Although this is a projection, it is interesting to see the reasoning behind the projected 7 percent decrease from 2012 to 2013. Sure enough the report notes the colder wetter weather for the decrease, in other words there are less motorcycles on the road when it is a colder wetter year (longer winter).

While this data is helpful in seeing the big picture and may be encouraging to believe that the issue is being taken care of, motorcycle awareness and safety awareness is key. In states with four seasons and extreme weather, the rate of motorcycle accidents may understandably decrease. There are also warmer states that don’t have winter weather.

While driver’s awareness is part of the puzzle, proper safety gear is just as (if not more) important. The evolution of motorcycle safety has come a long way since the beginning of the motorcycle in the 19th century. In the U.S., 47 states and the District of Columbia have helmet laws for motorcyclists with the other 3 States (Illinois, Iowa and New Hampshire) not having any motorcycle helmet law. The GHSA Report says that, “Helmets are proven to be 37 percent effective in preventing fatal injuries to motorcycle operators and 41 percent effective for passengers.”

Along with wearing a helmet, the GHSA Report recommends these addressing the 6 issues:

1. Increase Helmet Use

2. Reduce Alcohol Impairment

3. Reduce Speed

4. Providing motorcycle operator training to all who need and seek it

5. Ensure motorcyclists are properly licensed

6. Encourage all driver to share the road with a motorcyclists

Search for Statistics on the Malaysia Airlines Plane Crash Mystery

2014-03-13T15:03:00.000-04:00

Looking for background statistics to research the Malaysia Airlines disappearance and apparent plane crash?

Check out our search engine for statistics, or take a look at these links for more information:

IRchartnexus is an investment firm that has a financial background on Malaysia Airlines with links to Malaysia Airlines reports.

Flightstats.com can give you a background on flight records for Malaysia Airlines.

The Department of Civil Aviation Air Transport Division of Malaysia may have useful information buried somewhere in its website. (The investigative link wasn't active when I went to the website, and only one statistic report was available, which required a translation.) But you can also search the Aviation Safety Network for statistics, the International Air Transport Association (IATA), or International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). Comparing countries? The European Aviation Safety Agency or Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) may be of some help. Wikipedia has an entry on Aviation Accidents that contains a list of aviation organizations, associations and authorities that could be of value to you

The Department of Statistics Malaysia has an Offical Portal for statistics on the social demographics, business and economy of Malaysia.

(Photo Credit: Simon_Sees. Creative Commons License 2.0.)

BBC News and CNN continue news coverage of the (apparent) plane crash mystery, and you should stay updated with Interpol reports and findings.

Digital Globe is the company behind the impressive crowd sourcing initiative taking place to help scour an unfathomable amount of imagery shots for debris or other clues using Tomnod. You can find facts on ocean debris at the U.S. EPA website, statistics on ocean litter can be found in the National Marine Debris littering pdf file, and also at the Keep Australia Beautiful link on marine litter statistics.

Reddit users are weighing in heavily on the plane's disappearance and keeping other users updated with timelines and reliable news sources.

Statistics to the Boeing aircraft 777-220ER can be found on Boeing's technical characteristics page, Airliners.net Boeing 777-200 information page, and in a pdf file from the FAA website (with plenty of mathematical explanations for you statistical wizards).

You can find links for plane crash statistics in my old (lengthy, disorganized, but helpful) blog post on Plane Crash Statistics, and a few more in my post on the Buffalo (Clarence) New York freak plane crash.

The links to government and aviation statistic websites are included in the custom search engine on my page, so if you're looking for a specific fact, try the search engine for statistics at the top of this blog.

If you know of any other links that would be useful to others researching this plane's disappearance, feel free to provide them in the comments below.

Our hearts go out to all of the families and friends of those on board Malaysia Airline flight 370. Special condolences to Mei Ling Chng's family, friends and co-workers. My son and his family live in Pittsburgh, and Eastman Chemical supports our nearby town of Kingsport. For the sake of the families involved, we hope this mystery will soon be solved. Peace to all.

Teacher Quality Statistics

2012-01-25T11:37:00.007-05:00

"Teacher Quality" reports and statistics I find relate teacher quality to student test scores. (Heck, hand kids the answers and you'll be a brilliant teacher.) That gives these so called "Teacher Quality" reports a failing grade in my eyes - with or without the numerous "value-added" qualities incorporated into the results. And guess why NY went from a "D" to a "C" in the latest Teacher Quality reports? Because they tied teacher/student testing more closely together.

We've lost education inside of institutionalism. Using standardized testing to judge a child's knowledge is archaic and detrimental to true education. Using standardized testing to test teachers is just a continuation of taking the easy way out instead of being innovative. But, regardless of my opinion, robot-like testing isn't going away, and teacher quality is a highly controversial and hot political issue. I glaze over these reports because I think they're a farce, but I think many of you would be interested in knowing where to find the actual studies on "Quality Teaching" that are running amuck in the headlines.

When a new study comes out, the source, or some relationship to the source, is usually quoted in the article. Sometimes the source is vague, such as "a study funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation." Gee thanks. Do you KNOW how many different studies they've funded? I don't know either, but all their financial reports are online if you want to dig through. While you're at it, you can do a search for "teacher quality" on their website and get some useful reports. However, their pet MET (Methods of Effective Teaching) project is intertwined with recent teacher quality reports.

At least the Washington Examiner in their "Teacher Quality Study Ranks NY 13th Among States" article was nice enough to lead readers to the National Council of Teacher Quality website with a link at the end of the article. However, as an article in the magazine Governing points out, data is too often collected, but not shared.

Let's start with the National Council of Teacher Quality. Their purpose is to increase the number of effective teachers, and they are "committed to lending transparency and increasing public awareness about the four sets of institutions that have the greatest impact on teacher quality: states, teacher preparation programs, school districts and teachers unions" without partisanship getting in the way. There's about 50 different agencies that fund the Council. This is the organization that the press is getting data from.

The 2011 State Teacher Policy Yearbook has all the juicy data on why NY is 13th and how states have failed to make much progress. The National Council of Teachers seem to like the letter "C." It's safe. It's average. It's the grade most states (teachers) got. I bet Tennessee is loving the fact its at the top of the list and New York isn't. This Yearbook report is the report that all the Teacher Quality bashing articles floating around this mid-January 2012 are referring to. My beef? (Sorry vegetarian daughters.) My beef is that this report is on teacher quality inclusive of school and state policy changes, yet the headlines floating around tout teacher quality, with little or no mention of the extreme impact that school policies have on the final grade for teacher quality. Kids get misjudged by things that aren't seen all the time too, so I do feel for the teachers and states. And that is why it is so important that we know WHERE these "grades" for teacher quality are coming from when we start reading headlines about teacher quality. At least then you're armed with information on why these headlines and studies are a farce.

A very helpful tool on the Teacher Quality Council website is a place where You can build a custom report based on state, district, poverty levels, unions and bargaining, tenure, and all kinds of neat little variables.

Now let's look at the Data Quality Campaign and see what they have to offer for Teacher Quality statistics. Their purpose is to use the data to promote student achievement, and they have a strong focus on longitudinal studies. Their list of funding sources isn't as long as the Council on Teacher Quality, but Pew Research and the Gates are involved. You'll find charts that show which states are using the data they have, and which aren't and lots of suggestions on how data can and should be used. If you're interested in data implementation, data warehouses, and data coordinating efforts, then you'll be interested in the Data Quality Campaign website. But, if you just want straight-forward teacher quality information, you can skip the Quality Campaign website. Going to the Gates' foundation College Ready Education topic page gives you links to more useful teacher quality articles pdf style.

If you're bored, you can always sift through Ed.gov's website results for "teacher quality", or the results from the search engine on this blog (which I'm currently updating). The National Education Association has almost 30,000 results for teacher quality, but Ed Week had a sparse showing of articles in a search for teacher quality, the articles were even sparser for the search term at the Association for American Educators' website.

The National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality reports itself as a national resource for data with a goal to help the schools with the highest poverty rates and lowest performance rate. They have a database on State Teacher Evaluation Policies ,a bunch of interactive tools for evaluation that some of you might find useful, and what looks like to be a nice research library for data and research.

Of course, all this data and research is for the grants. It's always nice to read an article about small-town grant winners from Teacher Quality programs like those in Cleveland, TN who can now forge ahead in biotech. But more common are the articles bemoaning teacher quality. NBC's article on New York's faring in the quality test states that no state got an A. Doesn't that say something about the teacher?

Statistics on College Student Suicides and 2007 Suicide Stats

2011-08-19T21:04:00.010-04:00

Suicide. Fortunately, what prompted me to write this post is not a family suicide, nor the fact that I haven't written on this blog in a couple years, but rather my daughter's venting about her suicide training during Resident Assistant training at college. (We were laughing at instances of being trained to do the obvious. For instance, call 911 if you see someone unconscious on the floor. Really? And I thought they were supposed to hide the body under the bed.)

Suicide training started with the 2004 Garrett Lee Smith Memorial Act which is again facing Congress. This is the government's attempt to to support and enhance suicide prevention efforts in colleges and universities. We all know how the government works. Hence, the increase in suicides. Northwest Missouri University has an older paper addressing suicide training, and it's worth reading if you're delving into suicide research.

Regardless of our jokes about suicide training and training programs in general, my daughter and I have both known people who have tried to kill themselves, and we've known people who have committed suicide. I was going to do a post on suicide statistics - way too much information. Thought I'd narrow down the topic to suicide statistics in the US and then do another post about international statistics. Way too much information. Seeing as I had one son graduate from college this year, another daughter start college this year, and my daughter who was suicidal about her suicide training is a junior this year, it's appropriate to narrow it down to suicide and college kids, or teens, or whatever this evolves into.

If you need quick International Statistics, the 2011 US Census Report has 2006 suicide statistics on this pdf file - Korea and Hungary have the highest rates (much higher for men in both countries), and Greece has the lowest. In the US, more women commit suicide than men, and statistically speaking the US is somewhere in the middle. (Technical huh?) There's a multitude of more indepth statistics out there - you can use the search engine on my blog to search World Health Organization and all those great places. Everyone else can continue reading.

Back to the US. The (one of many) Official 2007 Statistics on Mortality is on the National Vital Statistics Report of 2007, Volume 58, Number 19. If you're looking for any statistics on death, this report is a good place to look. Suicide is listed as the 11th most common cause of death. (Technically, it's "intentional self-harm" - although I've read that intentional self-harm without death is technically not considered a suicide attempt. Wonder if the Emo generation changed that.)

Here's an interesting statistic - according to the above report, there are more suicides then there are murders. Homicide comes in at number 15. That does surprise me. When you bring race into the death rates, it turns out that blacks are far more likely to die from homicide, but whites are far more likely than blacks to die from suicide (If you're white, your chance of dying from suicide is twice as high as it would be if you were black.)

So what about guns? Here's what the report says:

Firearm suicide at 55.6 percent and homicide at 40.5 percent were the two major component causes of all firearm injury deaths in 2007.

Do you think it would be harder to pull the trigger on your own brain or someone else's?

Another fact to consider: suicide rates went up (3.7%), but deaths due to heart disease and cancer went down. Total deaths in the US were lower in 2007 then they were in 2006. All those statistics are in that Vital Statistics report above.

From the report:

The death rate for suicide has decreased slightly from a high of 13.7 deaths per 100,000 standard population in 1977 to a low of 10.4 in 2000.

Since 2000, the age adjusted death rate for suicide has increased by 8.7 percent [emphasis added].

Well that's not good. Gee, in 1999 the Surgeon General said there was a problem. In 2000 it was at it's lowest, but rose every year thereafter. In 2004 the Garrett Lee Smith Memorial Act was first passed. The suicide rate keeps rising. In fact, the suicide rate was the highest during the years that the government started getting involved in training. Funny how it was going down before the government got involved.

There is an interesting article from BioMed Central that questions the correlation and classifications of suicide and accidental poisoning. Their conclusion?

The official decline in the suicide rate between 1987 and 2000 may have been a partial artifact of misclassification of non-elderly suicides within unintentional poisoning mortality. We recommend in-depth national, regional, and local population-based research investigations of the poisoning-suicide nexus, and endorse calls for widening the scope of the definition of suicide and evaluation of its risk factors.

The above referred to paper includes interesting charts and trends, and it was just published in late 2010. Definitely worth reading if you're interested in statistics on suicide trends.

Personally I'd be looking up statistics on the increase in homework and suicide rates. (Okay, I admit it's not as simple as that - luckily.) But negative moods do create suicide tendencies. And it would be stating the obvious if I said happy people are less likely to commit suicide. Unfortunately, our genetics and serotonin levels and a multitude of other factors scientists are just learning about influence our lives and minds. Moods come in swings. (Ask any teenager or pregnant woman and they'll confirm that for you.) And apparently so do happiness levels in cities. The government's Healthfinder found that the states and nations that had the higher happiness levels, also had the higher suicide rates. The USA Today has an easy-reading list of state suicide rates from lowest to highest. Highest rate? Alaska. Lowest? Washington D.C.

If you like trends, the U.S. Vital Statistics has suicide trends from 1985 to 2004 depicted in several graphs in their Trends in Rates and Methods in Suicide. However they make the argument that due to interpretations of statistics, suicide rates have actually been declining up to 2004. One interesting fact they point out for 20-24 year olds (college students), is that firearms deaths have been decreasing, whereas suffocation has been increasing. If you start reading the 2007 report and these trend charts, you might come up with conflicting information. Have fun with that.

If you want to look at earlier statistics on suicides, this CDC sheet is from 2007 and lists suicide trends for Youths and Young Adults Aged 10-24 from 1990 to 2004. This report also addresses the change firearm related suicides and hanging/suffocation suicides. It's rather shocking how much hanging increased! From their suicide trend report:

In 2004, hanging/suffocation was the most common method among females in all three age groups, accounting for 71.4% of suicides in the group aged 10--14 years, 49% in the group aged 15--19 years, and 34.2% in the group aged 20--24 years.

In addition, from 2003 to 2004, hanging/suffocation suicide rates among females aged 10--14 and 15--19 years increased by 119.4% (from 0.31 to 0.68 per 100,000 persons) and 43.5% (from 1.24 to 1.78), respectively [emphasis added].

The report also mentions that a choking game was popular at the time.

Eerie to think about all these young people hanging themselves. But not unbelievable. My girls went to school with a couple kids that hung themselves during high school (not from playing a choking game). They also had a close friend who came home to find their dad hanging, still alive, in the garage from a botched suicide attempt. I have a neighbor who had a daughter who hung herself in her bedroom closet. These statistics aren't imaginary. And they are most likely under-reported. (The whole topic of under-reported suicide statistics could fill volumes of books - or should I say millions of Google pages.)

Much of the information reported in US Vital Statistics (and elsewhere on the web) is derived from reports by the Inventory of National Injury Data Systems. You'll find information on types of suicides, mortality, health, car accidents and anything related to health and injury somewhere in their links. They work with the Center for Disease Control and vice-versa on WISQARS, the Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System, definitely worth visiting.

The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention has a suicide statistics fact sheet. And another page they have on suicide statistics is a chart showing breakdown by age. I tried posting the chart, but it's not aligning. It's easy enough for you to click the link to the chart or copy and paste the chart off that link if you need it. Interesting fact: teens and college student suicides are declining, but 30+ are increasing. So maybe there is something to the government training...

Nah.

If you can't gather enough statistics about suicides and college students from the above links and from in this blog's statistic search engine, you can extract some statistics from these links:

Harvard Crimson 2009 article talks about college students and contemplating suicide.

MIT Year 2000 college suicide and national tends.

Some Harvard Stats on guns, homicide and suicide.

I'm linking you to an outdated page at the National Alliance of Mental Health (NAMI) but there's organizations listed on the bottom that could be useful as well. And of course the National Institute of Mental Health will have zillions of statistics.

The Children's Trend Data Bank is a new website to me, and they have a post on teens, homicides, suicides and guns.

And here's an article on college students exhibiting more mental illness.

And of course, search results from the search engine on my blog has a lot more links on suicide statistics about young adults, so you can start contemplating all the contrary missing information that is out there about suicide and suicide data.

At another CDC Prevention Fact Sheet, we find the sobering statistic that:

Among young adults ages 15 to 24 years old, there are approximately 100-200 attempts for every completed suicide.

Although that's sad, we can look at it as every 100 to 200 young adults get another chance at life. Next time depression hits, perhaps they'll take their chance at life, instead of taking their life. I think it's our job to show them there is value in life.

International Paradox of Low Mesothelioma Rates in America

2011-05-10T10:09:00.006-04:00

Though I wasn't planning on doing another post on asbestos statistics, a writer named Taylor Dardan asked me to do a guest post on mesothelioma. Taylor made the interesting correlation in the essay between America's success in keeping mesothelioma cancer rates down by regulating asbestos, and the domino effect of lowering public recognition of this asbestos-related disease. If America's awareness is lowered, it follows that international awareness of the correlation between asbestos and health will suffer as well. Canada is considering reopening a mine over one of the world's largest known asbestos deposits. Canada exports to India - where mesothelioma cancer rates are inordinately high. We live in a global world, and as Americans, we can make our fellow citizens and international friends aware that asbestos is deadly.

Alarming Statistics on Asbestos Exposure
by Taylor Darden

In America, people are used to seeing eye-popping statistics on the number of cancer diagnoses for the more "popular" cancers. For example, most people are at least vaguely aware that about one in eight women (12%) will develop invasive breast cancer. They may be aware that over one-hundred and fifty thousand people died of lung cancer in 2007 (the most recent year the numbers were available). Or, that more people died of lung cancer in America than any other cancer. However the statistics on supposedly rare cancers like mesothelioma have far less recognition by the general public.

Partially, this is because American statistics on mesothelioma are not considerably shocking. Only about three thousand cases are diagnosed each year. The majority of those cases occur in people between the ages of fifty and seventy, and nearly a third occur in veterans. Because it is rare, it is often overlooked or ignored. In terms of statistical awareness, mesothelioma is a forgotten cancer.

However, the statistics on worldwide mesothelioma cancer rates paints a strikingly different picture. The number of mesothelioma diagnoses sky rockets to over one-hundred thousand a year. As most of these cases are diagnosed in third-world countries, it’s likely the figures are highly understated. Combined with the extremely low mesothelioma survival rate (most patients survive only twelve to fourteen months after their initial diagnosis), it’s clear that mesothelioma deserves far more attention than it currently receives.

But even these statistics understate the truly alarming statistics about mesothelioma. The fact is, mesothelioma could be far lower. Mesothelimoa is a result of asbestos exposure. In fact, the rate of mesothelioma diagnosis in America is so low because asbestos use is heavily regulated, as it is throughout most developed countries. However, even developed countries such as Canada continue to export thousands of tons of asbestos - despite knowing the deadly consequences.

Canada exports nearly two-hundred thousand tons of asbestos a year to third-world countries such as India, where health and safety regulations are lax, and a staggering portion of the mesothelioma diagnoses are made each year. Even worse, Canadians plan on reopening the Jeffrey Mine, which sits atop the world’s largest deposit of asbestos, and has already produced over one-hundred and fifty thousand tons of asbestos since 2006 by itself. The Canadian government is currently debating propping up the Jeffrey Mine, which sits atop the world’s largest asbestos deposit, with a $58 million dollar loan that should allow it to export over two-hundred tons of asbestos each day at the request of the mine’s owner G. Bernard Coulombe.

Coulombe’s strategy is to reinvent the small Quebec town Asbestos, named after the mineral during its boom days in the mid 20th century, where the Jeffrey Mine is located by reopening the mine and selling the deadly material to India, Pakistan, and Vietnam. Quebec, which is part of the mineral’s part of its mining history still advocated its use and insists, against the words of the WHO and all international experts, that asbestos is safe. Despite this, asbestos use is heavily regulated in Quebec, as well as the rest of Canada.

The wide gap in the statistics between mesothelioma occurrences in America and worldwide demonstrate our ability to effectively prevent the cancer- but it requires far more attention and awareness than it is currently receiving. Ironically the mundane quality of the statistics in America may to be blame for this, even as they provide a textbook case for why the worldwide numbers are so alarming.

Teenage Pregnancy Statistics and Live Births - The Babies are Comin'

2009-10-26T13:05:00.013-04:00

Teenage pregnancy statistics seem to be in demand according to my blog stats. By looking at my teens' friends' profiles, I can see that teenage pregnancies are no longer an uncommon occurrence, and hearing that a teen friend is pregnant is no longer shocking news.

I've been wanting to post some recent statistics on teenage pregnancy since I wrote my short blog post on Sex and the City and Teen Pregnancies but got sidetracked by life (certainly not by sex or TV). I recalled reading that teen pregnancies were on a steady decline, yet over the last year it seemed as if my teens had more friends than usual displaying pregnant teenage bellies on MySpace or Facebook. Both of my teen daughters' cell phones have adorable pictures of newborn babies sent to them from a new teen mom, and it isn't highly unusual for a group of teens to have a sleepover at a hospital to support a teenage laboring (or false-laboring) friend. My kids tell me who's been pregnant, who's had an abortion (or two or three) and have pretty much informed me that they are the only virgins in the world.

When my 20-somethings were in high school, there were teen pregnancies here and there, but it certainly seems as if I hear more about them now. Are more teens having babies or is the world of social media just increasing awareness? Statistics show that more teens are having babies, but they still aren't at the percentages of live births that prevailed in the 90's . From 1991 to 2005, teen pregnancies were consistently declining. A large Center for Disease Control report shows that abortion rates overall were declining, however teenage abortion statistics fluctuated.

Then came the news - 2006 and 2007 statistics showing that teenage pregnancies and live births were on the rise.

Childtrends.org has an easy to read 2008 pdf file with statistics and tables on teen births by year, state and even city. Although the recent small increases are relighting a fire underneath sex education, as Childtrends.org explains:

Despite the recent increase, the overall 2006 teen birth rate was 32% lower than the recent peak rate of 61.8 in 1991 and 12% lower than the 2000 rate of 47.7.

...between 2000 and 2006, the annual number of births to teen females has declined by 7%.

Childtrends.org also has a webpage listing a variety of statistics on teen births 1991 - 2005, and has a webpage with a list of 100 indicators for child health that they offer in their databank.

What's often overlooked when citing the increasing trend of teen births is the fact that all live births in general, to women of all ages, have increased during the same period as well. It's also important to remember that the data defined as "teenagers" is often grouped under different age ranges between organizations.

The CDC is likely the most frequently-referenced website for United States birth statistics, and they have a simple "Fast Stats" page with the national "basic" statistics on birth. The "Fast Stats" for teens states there were 435,436 live births to 15-19 year olds in 2006.

The entire 2006 report is in a 102 page pdf file. If you need to create your own tables, check out the CDC's Vital Stats statistics tool. There's also a 2008 Teenage Pregnancy statistics page, however much of that data appears to be from 2004.

The number of teen pregnancies that ended in successful births as reported in the CDC National Vital Statistics System Table 1993-2006 is as follows:

Year % Births to Under 20 years of age
1993 12.8
1994 13.1
1995 13.1
1996 12.9
1997 12.7
1998 12.5
1999 12.3
2000 11.8
2001 11.3
2002 10.8
2003 10.3
2004 10.3
2005 10.2
2006 10.4

(I can't seem to format the table for this blog so you'll have to squint to make out the separations in the columns.)

The CDC also has some stats on sexual behavior (intercourse, contraception, oral sex), which parents may or may not want to know. You can find other behavioral statistics at the Childstats.gov website, at their webpage for Americas Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being for 2009 under "behavior".

2006 figures from the national Center for Disease Control show that 41.9 births per 1,000 females aged 15–19 is the current rate of live births for teens.

From the Rural Assistance Center:

Teen pregnancy rates in the United States are higher than most of the industrialized world with 31% of all teenage girls getting pregnant at least once before they reach age 20. This results in 750,000 teen pregnancies a year. According to data from the National Center for Health Statistics, between 2005 and 2006, births to teens rose by 20,834 for a total of 435,427 live births to children and teens between the ages 10 and 19 years of age - the first increase in 15 years.

About 760,000 teens become pregnant each year; 80% of those pregnancies are unintended and nearly one-third end in abortions.

According to data from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), the preliminary birth rate for U.S. teenagers 15–19 years rose 3 percent between 2005 and 2006, the first increase reported since 1991. Three in ten teen girls become pregnant by age 20 and most of these pregnancies are unintended. Additionally one-quarter of teen parents have a second child before they turn 20.

A CDC "Quick Stats" report on live teen births has a simple graph demonstrating the decrease, however shows only ages 15 and up. Teen pregnancies from 18 and 19 year olds increased the most. Their statistics reported are as follows:

After increasing 23% overall from 1986 to a peak in 1991 and then decreasing 34% by 2005, the birth rate for teens aged 15--19 years increased 5% from 2005 to 2007. Most of this increase occurred in 2006. Increases in birth rates from 2005 to 2007 for teens aged 18--19 years were slightly larger than the increases for teens aged 15--17 years.

There is a pdf "Preliminary Data Report" on births for 2007, which reportedly shows that 2007 has the "highest number of births ever recorded in the United States." Look out Baby Boomers - you've been beat.

With regard to teenage pregnancies ending in a successful birth, the report states:

The birth rate for U.S. teenagers 15–19 years rose again in 2007 by about 1 percent, to 42.5 births per 1,000. The birth rate for teenagers 15–17 and 18–19 years each increased by 1 percent in 2007, to 22.2 and 73.9 per 1,000, respectively. The rate for the youngest group, 10–14 years, was unchanged. Birth rates also increased for women in their twenties, thirties, and early forties between 2006 and 2007. The 2007 total fertility rate increased to 2,122.5 births per 1,000 women. All measures of childbearing by unmarried women rose to historic levels in 2007, with the number of births, birth rate, and proportion of births to unmarried women increasing 3 to 5 percent.

In 2004, the CDC reported that in 2002 births to young teenage mothers (10 - 14) were at the lowest level since 1948. Their interpretation of the data:

Between 1990 and 2002 almost 137,000 of these young mothers delivered a live birth. This number has declined steadily from a peak of 12,901 in 1994, to the current low of 7,315. If the 1990 rate had held through 2002, there would have been 34,336 additional births to the youngest teens. The 43 percent decline in the number of births occurred despite the 16 percent rise in the female population aged 10-14 years.

Also,

About two-fifths of the pregnancies among 10–14 year olds in 2000 ended in a live birth, two-fifths ended in induced abortion, and about one in six ended in a fetal loss (28). These proportions have been fairly stable since 1976, when this series of national pregnancy estimates was inaugurated.

If you're interested in seeing a proportional graph of 10-14 year old pregnancies and abortions, take a look at the 2004 pdf file of 1990 to 2002 data. There's a lot of sadness behind those numbers.

The 2007 pdf preliminary report states:

Among teenagers (under 20 years), only the rate for the youngest group, 10–14 years, was unchanged, at 0.6 births per 1,000. The number of births to this age group fell 3 percent, reflecting the declining number of females aged 10–14 years.

I find that interesting since I've noticed a prevailing trend for adults (and teenagers) to believe that more kids are getting pregnant at younger ages.

A "provisional" CDC report with 2008 and 2009 vital statistics on birth, death, marriage and divorce is available, however there is no breakdown of age, and the data does not include some large states. Are we seeing downward trends?

You can find information on birth and fertility among women of all ages, as well as abortion rates and extensive statistics and trends on health issues in the CDC's 600+ page pdf 2008 Health Report of the United States. Comparison statistics from the CDC and The Guttmacher Institute in this comprehensive report. Links to pregnancy, abortion and std data can be found on the CDC "Reproductive Health" page.

A brief snippet of some abortion statistics:

In 2005, 820,151 legal induced abortions were reported to CDC from 49 reporting areas. This total represents a 2.3% decrease from the 839,226 abortions reported for 2004. The abortion ratio for 2005 decreased since 2004. The ratio was 233 legal induced abortions per 1,000 live births in 2005. In 2005, the abortion rate was 15 per 1,000 women aged 15–44 years of age, the same since 2000. For the same 46 reporting areas, the abortion rate remained relatively constant during 1998–2005.

Their 36 page pdf report, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report Abortion Surveillance United States 2005, published in November 2008, reports as follows:

A total of 820,151 legal induced abortions were reported to CDC for 2005 from 49 reporting areas, the abortion ratio (number of abortions per 1,000 live births) was 233, and the abortion rate was 15 per 1,000 women aged 15–44 years. For the 46 reporting areas that have consistently reported since 1995, the abortion rate declined during 1995–2000 but has remained unchanged since 2000.

For 2005, the highest percentages of reported abortions were for women who were known to be unmarried (81%), white (53%), and aged 25 years (50%).

For the 46 reporting areas that have consistently reported since 1995, the number of abortions has steadily declined over the previous 10 years. The abortion rate declined from 1995 to 2000, but remained unchanged since 2000. In 2004, as in the previous years, deaths related to legal induced abortions occurred rarely.

The abortion ratios by state or area of occurrence ranged from 48 per 1,000 live births in Idaho to 756 per 1,000 in NYC. Among women aged 15–44 years, rates by occurrence ranged from four per 1,000 women in Idaho to 30 per 1,000 in New York State.

Women known to be aged 20–24 years obtained 33% of all abortions for which age was adequately reported. Adolescents aged under 15 years obtained less than 1.0% of all abortions in the 48 areas that reported age.

Statistics on Legal Abortions:

Year Total Abortions % under 19 years old

1995 1210883 20.1
1996 1225937 20.3
1997 1186039 20.1
1998 884273 19.8
1999 861789 19.2
2000 857475 18.8
2001 853485 18.1
2002 854122 17.5
2003 848163 17.4
2004 839226 17.4
2005 820151 17.1

(Ugh, tables aren't working...)

If you're interested in the quadratic and linear trends of teen pregnancies, births and abortions as well as contraception and teen behavior, the Guttmacher Institute has a 2007 pdf report on teen pregnancy and behavioral risk that is the result of a 16 year study. It's worth a read even if you don't understand quadratic trends. (I'll have to look that up...)

Granted, teen births increased a bit - but 10.4 in the 21st century is still a heck of a lot better than the 13.1 of the 20th century. But the little jump did make the news.

Bloomberg.com published a 2009 article announcing teenage pregnancy and birth statistics for 2006 and 2007, however their article pointed out that the increase from 2006 to 2007 was only one percent, which is lower than the 2.8 percent increase from 2005 to 2006.

In January of 2009, USA Today reported state-by-state increases in teen pregnancies from 2006 statistics. Mississippi (68.4%), Texas (63.1%) and New Mexico (64.1%) had the highest increases. Northeastern states showed the lowest increases, and New York, North Dakota, Rhode Island and the District of Columbia even showed a decrease in the number of teen pregnancies. Nonetheless, the increases were enough to drop down the mother's average age to have their first child from 25.2 to 25. USA Today reports that this is the first drop in the first-time mother's age since 1968.

If you're looking for state statistics on teenage pregnancies and births, the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Teenage Pregnancies has lots of statistics on teenage pregnancies, including a link to state-by-state statistics on teen pregnancies, demographics and trend data, charts, related resources, and search tools for more particular indicators, data and statistics on teen pregnancies.

They have a 2006 list of the number of teen births by state, which indicates there were 435,436 teen births in the US in 2006. (No surprise that the largest states have the largest numbers of teen births.) Take note of the fine print when reading their reported number of teen pregnancies for 2000 (they report 821,810 nationally), because despite the headline stating 2000 statistics, the fine print says it was collected from 2004 statistics - but this is before the 2006 increases. Your best bet for quick teen birth rate statistics by state is to look at their webpage that shows 2009 pdf file which has a table of teen pregnancy statistics from 1991 to 2006 by state, or their preliminary 2007 data by age.

If you want to data-delve, make sure you look at the Guttmacher Institute's January 2009 report on inaccurate data on teen births. The Guttmacher Institute is concerned with worldwide teenage pregnancies and birth, and they are an oft-quoted source for reproductive data. They do have a "table-maker" which looks pretty easy to use to search for refined data on teenage pregnancies, abortions and health. They also have a webpage listing their published statistics on pregnancies, abortions, funding, contraception and other reproductive issues.

You'd think with technology as sophisticated as it is there would be more up-to-date or even “real time” data on teenage pregnancy statistics.

Data collection should be more like this: Visit Hospital. Deliver Baby. Fill out Birth Certificate on mobile phone. Hit send.

Voila. Real time data transmitted. There's no doubt that teens can text through labor. Just have them send a quick text to vital statistics when the baby is delivered while they're texting their friends. Most teens delivering babies could probably text the information around the world faster than the government can process it.

I really wanted to list some links for worldwide teenage pregnancy statistics, but I'll have to save that for another post. This blog post is getting a little long and a little too disorganized - and it's getting past my bedtime - so it's time to sign off. I'll have to update my search engine tomorrow.

Hope these links will help you find some statistics on teenage pregnancy. If you can't find what you need, try searching for "reproductive health" statistics, "live births," "mortality" and/or "abortion" to search for the statistics you need. If I can help you with anything, just shoot me an email.

My teenage days and my giving birth days are over...it's time for this old body to get to bed....

If you find yourself needing an FDA approved home pregnancy test, home paternity test or fertility test, pay a visit to Test Country for professional, discreet and convenient testing and results.

Car Accident Statistics, Fatalities, Women Drivers and a Few Drunks

2009-07-13T18:11:00.008-04:00

Car accident statistics seemed like a good topic to post since my two teens are in the midst of getting their driver's licenses and their first (very used) cars. On top of that, my latest writing assignment was coincidentally on car insurance - just as I was panicking over how high my car insurance rates will rise once they're both on my policy. Fortunately, I have stayed alive to write this post even through their first bout of city driving.

Just to warn everyone - there's going to be a couple more women drivers on the road. Statistically speaking, despite slanderous jargon about women drivers (mostly from my father), people should be grateful that these two new drivers are women and not men. Even recent 2007 fatality statistics by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety shows that men are the drivers in the high majority of fatal accidents. The Institute's 2007 Fact Sheet has charts demonstrating fatal accident and gender statistics from 1975 to 2007.

Of course, the Center for Disease Control's Teen Driver Fact Sheet's mention of car accidents being the number one reason for teenage deaths in the US doesn't help me sleep well at night when my teens are out with their friends. But within these teenage statistics from the CDC is the data that teen female drivers between the ages of 16 and 19 are far less likely to die than their male friends. The CDC looks like they also have some interactive statistics and mapping toys that can be used to investigate car accident statistics.

Personally, if I were to compare my older boys with my two teen girls and their driving style, I have one in each gender that is very cautious and rule abiding, and I also have on in each gender that is over-confident about their driving abilities. Over-confidence can be a killer, but it is probably not as deadly as alcohol. (However, that's debatable. We haven't mastered measuring car accidents due to over-confidence yet.)

Men are responsible for the majority of alcohol realted deaths. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, in their gender report states the difference:

From 1982 to 2007, the proportion of fatally injured passenger vehicle drivers with blood alcohol concentrations (BACs) at or above 0.08 percent declined by 29 percent among males and 37 percent among females. Since 1985 the percentage of fatally injured male drivers with high BACs has been about twice that of female drivers.

Under the quote in that report is data from the 1980s to 2007 that lists statistics on alcohol related car accidents and BAC levels. The good news is that alcohol related fatal deaths are decreasing. And so are car accidents. CNN has a news article summarizing some alcohol related car accident statistics.

In the US, car accidents reached their all-time low since the rumbling days of hot rods and drag racing in the 1960s and the peak of the 1970s according to 2008 statistics (reported in June 2009) from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in their 2008 statistics summary of traffic safety facts. If you need to go global, you'll find some links on the US Department of State Travel page that has links to transportation and traffic statistics. (More global websites for international car accident statistics are listed later on in this blog post.)

Here is a link to the cache version of the NHTSA report that appears in Google Doc form:

Google Doc version of National Highway Traffic Safety Administration(NHTSA)2008 Traffic Safety Facts.

Here is a link to the pdf version of the NHTSA report:

PDF version of National Highway Traffic Safety Administration(NHTSA)2008 Traffic Safety Facts.

Overall, the number of people injured in car accidents in the US dropped from the 2.49 million in 2007 to "only" 2.35 million in 2008. The 2008 NHTSA car accident statistic report has a lot of valuable statistics and data and is likely one of the more recent sources for car accident statistics. You can also take a look at the Bureau of Transportation Statistics website for traffic data to support car accident data research. You'll also find some car accident statistics hiding in railroad, airline and boat accident statistics. (I have more research links on plane crashes and holiday travel statistics under the "transportation" labeled blog posts if you need more information in those areas.)

Another popular source for car accident statistics is the FARS - Fatality Analysis Report System. They have comparative statistics of car accidents and motorcycle accidents in a nicely laid out table that runs from 1994 to 2007. Ratios, mileage and population comparisons are listed as well as car accident statistics involving pedestrians and bicylists. FARS also has links to 2007 car accident statistics by state, (no surprise that California has the most and Rhode Island has the least) which list fatal accident statistics, as well as car accident statistics that involve a collision with an object. Their car accident reports by state also includes a page of alcohol related car accident statistics and BAC level statistics by state.

The FARR website also has links to trends and other reports, data and statistics on vehicle accidents. They even have a link to an excellent query page that offers tabulation reports on all sorts of data like vehicle types, times, license status, driver height, and all kinds of goodies. Great stuff if you need to get down and dirty and put your stats into a spreadsheet or need some good data to prove or refute a point. Ooooo time to play...wow that's great - after doing a query you get to go to see the full information of each report filed if you want. Code 11 in sequence of events is hitting an animal. I was just looking at deer statistics, however I know that there are always people hitting deer around here and getting their cars dented, but accident reports are hardly ever made.

Since I have no need for the data now I better stop playing. Let's move on to global and international car accident statistics. What better place to start than the World Health Organization. WHO knows everything about what's going on in the world, because in one way or another, everything will probably affect a person's health. They even have a page on world car accident information. A 2004 page describes motor vehicle accidents as a "hidden epidemic" with statistics backing up the claim. WHO has a lot of pdf reports on road injuries and road safety around the world.

There is a "Causes of Death" Excel file on the World Health Organizations Data and Statistics page that gives you a great spreadsheet of deaths by countries, and it includes data on deaths due to "road traffic accidents" by country. On the Pan American page of unintentional accidents on the WHO website you can find a link to a world traffic injury and prevention report that contains road traffic and vehicle accident research and statistics. You can also take a look at a WHO European page that shows some car accident statistics that closely mirrors the US and a list of links to European road traffic safety, injury and transport reports. You can also find some nice graphs and charts in the 2007 European Road Safety Day car accident and traffic safety report.

The BAST (Federal Highway Research Institute in Germany) has pdfs and links to car accident statistics in Germany.

A google book result brings up the WHO's World Report on Road Traffic which contains a lot of statistics and information, although I'm not sure how the information on the website differs from the information in the book, but it might be quicker just to look at the google book result to get a quick overview of international car accident statistics.

Wikipedia has links to resources for car accident statistics on their entry for Traffic Collision and Road Traffic Safety. From there you'll also see a Wikipedia link to information on the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, Road Casulaties Great Britain, a list of car accidents (motor vehicle accidents) in Japan and car accidents in Thailand.

UK car accident statistics can be found on the Department of Transport (DfT) website page containing transportation and traffic statistics and statistics on UK accidents. They also have a report on forecasting older driver accidents.

If those aren't enough, you can find more UK car accident statistics at the UK's Office of National Statistics (ONS) website and their page on UK road traffic accident statistics. The British Medical Journal has a free text study which includes statistics comparing car accident police reports and hospital records. (I love the BMJ and use it a lot. I wish all journals would provide free full text!)

If you want to go a wee bit south in the Commonwealth and need some car accident statistics on New South Wales, Australia, head over to their Road and Traffic Authority website and look at their page on crash statistics for free download information on Australia car accident statistics.

Staying south, the South African Department of Transportation website has a link to car accident statistics and road safety information in South Africa covering 2001 to 2005,with some statistics from the 1990s thrown in. There's also graphs in the report comparing South Africa statistics to Australia, China and other countries. Other statistics on South Africa car accidents can be found at the "about us" page Road Safety in South Africa and the "Arrive Alive" website that published the "about us" post, including some 2009 accident stats from Africa's N4 Toll Route.

Science Daily, (one of my favorite websites), has a short article stating some car accident statistics in Africa while claiming that Africa has the highest death rate from car accidents compared to other countries. If you're interested in data collection methods used in collecting Africa car accident statistics, someone was kind enough to upload a report on the implementation and process of using a MAPP data collection method in Africa. (If you're interested in more links on statistics and data involving Africa in general, take a look at my blog posts tagged Africa.)

If you want to delve into some car accident statistics and road traffic statistics, check out the uploaded documents at thesearch results at Scribd for "road traffic accidents," and the graphs and charts posted on "car accidents" at Swivel, or even the "road traffic safety" search results from my blog (that now needs some serious updating).

Looking at these stats, I'm very grateful that my life has never been touched directly by a fatal car accident, although my teenagers always seem to know somebody who knows somebody who was in a near-fatal accident. I have known a few women from church who lost their teens in car accidents - an unbearable thought to me. My boyfriend, however, was touched directly by fatal accidents, and lost his brother and his son to two different motorcycle accidents (years apart) - one caused by a drunk driver in a car, and one caused by teenage over-confidence. No statistic in the world can represent that loss and pain of losing a family member, and especially a child.

It's good to see that car accidents are being lowered, and drunk driving is on a downhill slide. I hope the road safety advocates keep up the good work and are continuously successful at saving lives and keeping our young ones alive.

Foreclosure Statistics and Foreclosure Defense Links

2009-07-01T13:17:00.006-04:00

Foreclosure news is getting tiring, but since I'm joining the ranks of people with their houses in foreclosure and I haven't written in a while, I thought I'd throw up a post on foreclosure statistics to help those who are looking to find the latest foreclosure statistics. Personally, I'm just sick of reading about and dealing with foreclosure news and information. On top of my own foreclosure, I've had a few assignments writing articles on foreclosure and bankruptcy. No pity for me though, I'm looking forward to moving, my house is falling apart, and the house is in my ex-husband's name whom I haven't seen in four years. It'll be a weather shock though - we're planning on moving from NY to the Tri-cities area in TN. I'll be positioned right in the middle of my kids in PA, VA and NC. I'm tired of fighting winter and I have a low-tolerance for the cold, so I'll appreciate the above-zero no-shoveling-or-getting-stuck-in-the-driveway winters.

If you're looking for NY courts, forms and regulations, try the New York State Unified Court System website, and their page with a couple new 2008 foreclosure regulations. You can also find lots of court forms needed for foreclosure proceedings at the NY Bar Association website. A NY Times May 2009 article stated foreclosures are happening now more than ever in NY, so I don't feel all alone. The article has some easy to refer to charts and statistics as well. CNN reported that California is suffering from the most foreclosures, and also brought to light that the children suffer as a result of unexpected and financially difficult moves. Even as a mother of six, I hadn't given thought to the great impact foreclosure has on young children. Perhaps because my kids are going off to college anyhow (4 down, 2 to go), and the remaining two and I are looking forward to moving. I do think the effects of foreclosure on children is a topic that definitely deserves more attention, and likely more study.

Statehealth.org has foreclosure ranks and percentage changes by state. Virginia University has a 2009 report ccomparing foreclosure and housing statistics between states and metro areas. The Center for Housing Policy, a partner of the National Housing Conference, has a comprehensive state and metro comparison, drop down search option for statistics by metro area on their "Paycheck to Paycheck" analysis, and a list of housing and foreclosure reports.

If you need Federal data and statistics on foreclosure, the Federal Reserve Board has foreclosure maps and foreclosure trends, as well as a dedicated area for foreclosure resources. Docuticker is a "ticker" website of updated government news, and has updates of the latest foreclosure news from government agencies. You can always review the latest foreclosure search results from the White House website, or US Treasury search results on foreclosure,. The FDIC has some random foreclosure statistics, and if you want to browse through some 2009 foreclosure statistics in pdf files you can take a look at the FDIC's foreclosure search results. If you're looking for information on the banking industry, the FDIC also has links to banking data and statistics (obviously). The FDIC has a quarterly report in pdf form that you can view for 2009 statistics.

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) gets quoted a lot in the news, but they don't have a lot of free statistics on their website. However, the Research Institute of Housing America (RIHA) is a trust 501(c) under the Mortgage Bankers Association, and is a good source for mortgage and housing data. You can also find the latest foreclosure statistics in news articles from websites like Market Watch.

Having a blog post on foreclosure statistics would be incomplete without mentioning HUD. First of all, they have datasets from the oft-referred to yearly American Housing Survey. HUD also has a research link with some housing data and statistics, and an "online library" to pursue HUD related topics a little further.

If you've gone to Realty Trac, take a look at this recent article examining the accuracy of foreclosure statistics reported by Realty Trac. I just found the Foreclosure Industry website, and it looks like it's keeping up with current foreclosure statistics, and the "Loan Audit" blog that is keeping up with mortgage and housing news.

You'll also find more data and recent news on foreclosure from a search result at the search engine in my blog.

For anyone wanting some legal resources on affirmative defenses to foreclosure, or just general legal information on foreclosure, I found the "Foreclosure Defense Group" website helpful, and I believe I used information from the Patriot's War website (although it was on their old website, they have a lot of info on their new one). NOLO is a publisher of legal books and their website is to promote their products, but they have a lot of links to free information, and I've often found their website very helpful in the beginning stages of research. They also have a useful page dedicated to foreclosure information and proceedings. You can also take a look at Kenneth M DeLashmutt's very nice article which includes easy to understand steps and defenses as well as a few case citations and useful foreclosure links. The Preventing Foreclosure blog has useful information, foreclosure defenses, and forms. If you haven't paid a visit to Scribd, they have tons of documents that people have uploaded to search. Try the search results for foreclosure or foreclosure affirmative defenses. There's also the Foreclosure Defense Nationwide blog with case citations and quotes from court foreclosure filings.

Above all, if you know someone who has received a Summons and Complaint for a foreclosure, make sure they serve their legal Answer within 20 days, even if it's "pro se." It will stall the foreclosure for months, and they'll have time to either get an attorney, look into loan modification, arbitration and settlement opportunities, deed-in-lieu of foreclosure, short sales, bankruptcy, and other prevention strategies and foreclosure options, or even wait for upcoming help for homeowners. There's a lot out there, and if you serve an Answer in time, you'll have time to review those options. Shoot me an email at getanswerserved at gmail dot com if you need some help typing up an answer to serve "pro se" and can't afford an attorney.

Well, I'm still sick of reading about foreclosure but they're not going away any time soon. I know there are thousands of other resources out there, unfortunately I wasn't able to pinpoint them all. I'll keep updating my blog's search engine so you can always check for more foreclosure statistics.

It's time for me to pack up now (pathetic pun intended)...happy statistics hunting or happy house hunting!

P.S. How could I forget my dear friend Swivel? Don't forget to check out foreclosure statistics, graphs and charts created by the Swivel community!

Eat, Sleep, and Read Statistics on International Social Progress

2009-05-05T19:43:00.005-04:00

I'm back from my four week hiatus away from civilization. My satellite contract had to be renewed, and to make a long story short, I evaluated other Internet options, none of which were financially feasible, then the satellite dish had to be repositioned to find reception amongst towering trees. It took a few days on the phone (being transferred a zillion times) to a tech person in India (who didn't quite understand how tall the trees actually were) to get the job done. (I thought my addiction to coffee was bad...try not having information at your fingertips for a month!) Well now that I've vented...how about that 2009 OECD report?

Couldn't help but click on the Yahoo news feature comparing the eating and sleeping habits between US and France. Live Science had their take on the international OECD report as well, and included a chart with comparisons of sleeping habits between the 18 countries included in the report.

This not-talked-about-enough report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) had a lot more information than just sleeping and eating habits. It stated some common knowledge, like the fact that men have more leisure time than women. (Women certainly don't need statistics to prove it!) But aside from eating, sleeping and leisure time, you'll find data on unemployment, poverty, social and health issues, inequality, demographics and work and life.

These sleeping, eating, and men-have-more-fun-than women statistics came from the OECD's "Society at a Glance 2009 - OECD Social Indicators" report. They have a link for the data and indicators included in this report, but they do indicate there is some privileged information for accredited journalists. (C'mon hackers - help us bloggers out!) I don't know why us lowly bloggers aren't good enough to accumulate a little extra knowledge ($$ comes to mind), but I have to admit there are a lot of nice free statistics in this progress report. They do come in the awkward form of .pdf and .xls files for separate chapters, but the data is useful nonetheless. The data and indicators included are divided into data groups as follows:

1. Headline Social Indicators

2. Measuring Leisure in OECD Countries

3. Interpreting OECD Social Indicators

4. General Context Indicators

Net national income per capita
Fertility rates
Migration
Marriage and divorce

5. Self-sufficiency Indicators

Employment
Unemployment
Childcare
Student performance
Not in employment, education or training
Age of labour force exit
Spending on education

6. Equity Indicators:

Income inequality
Poverty
Poverty among children
Adequacy of benefits of last resort
Public social spending
Total social spending

7. Health Indicators

Life expectancy
Perceived health status
Infant health
Obesity
Height
Mental health
Long-term care recipients
Health care expenditure

8. Social Cohesion Indicators

Life satisfaction
Work satisfaction
Crime victimisation
Suicides
Bullying
Risky behaviour

The OECD website has some great international statistics in other reports as well. Their 2008 annual report is a full free pdf download of 118 pages that covers the world economy and is full of quotable statistics. Elsewhere on the site, you'll find data and statistics on international employment, wages and benefits, and international social expenditures data for the past few years as well. I enjoyed reading this page on world educational statistics. There's also statistics available on their Source Data page, but I believe these are a combination of free statistics and priced statistic resources.

There is also a very nice page of links to other social policy websites that I'm sure are rich with useful (and free) international data and statistics. (If you're interested in more websites with international statistics, there's a lot of links to reputable international statistics in my post on International Relief and Humanitarian Aide statistics.)

This OECD website is great. Pay a visit and browse around if you're looking for international data and statistics. I have to make sure it's included in the statistics search engine I have on this blog, (which, by the way, I've updated recently), so I'm going to post this. Then I'll try and eat and sleep like the French, and steal some of that leisure time from men!

Post Script: While I was testing my search for OECD during my fight with Google Custom Engine (which has made changes not to my liking and my search engine is now likely not to my liking also), I saw that Mr. Warner posted some great links from their website a month ago! Mr. Warner has some OECD regional links and more information on the valuable data at OECD. Now I have to continue hitting my computer with an axe...

Planes Flying a Little too Low in Buffalo

2009-02-16T18:29:00.007-05:00

Planes flying over our house are suddenly becoming eerie. Two months ago I did a post on plane crash statistics because my eight year old had a fear of a plane falling on our house. (We get a lot of small town planes flying overhead.) I felt lucky because a month went by without a single night of her praying that a plane didn't crash on our house.

Then we had a wind storm. Electric went out. Kids didn't have school because there was no electricity. She prayed that night for a plane not to crash on our house. It gave me the chills too because it was horribly windy outside. The next night, I'm writing away and get a CNN alert that a plane crashed in Buffalo - a mile from my dad's house. The Buffalo plane crash of Continental Flight 3407 was little too close for comfort. I was shocked as I followed the story on CNN and couldn't pull myself away.

Turns out one of the girls on the Buffalo Plane that crashed, 19 year old Beth Kushner on Flight 3407, went to school with my son in Eden, New York, and Joe and Beth both used to live in Angola, NY. He has a beautiful picture of her on his blog. Just looking at this smiling picture of this promising young happy girl and imagining what she went through, and what her relatives must be going through makes me want to cry. My son nor I knew Beth. I can only imagine the sorrow her family must feel. What if it was my daughter flying home from college? What if that was my 19 year old son? What if the plane had gone a mile further and landed on my father's house? And then there's always the question - how could God let this happen?

I reason that he doesn't. It's man's plane. Man's mechanics. We are not puppets. So where are the angels and where are the miracles? I just hope that the crash had such a great impact that none of them experienced any pain. I've been unconscious before, and I know when you're out - you're out. You feel nothing. I hope that's what they felt. People burning in Australian wildfires and burning planes are too much to bear thinking about.

Does anyone else find it ironic that Continental's airline magazine has this quote on the airline magazine's front page (advertising Manhattan):

"All free, all moments that stick in the memory, and all in New York"

Do you think they're referencing the Hudson River landing and Buffalo NY plane crash?

Also in the Buffalo plane crash was Ellyce Kausner was a 24 year old law student on her way to her nephew's Valentine's Day party. And Madaline Loftus was another 24 year old victim of the Buffalo plane crash. She was headed to Buffalo State College, where my son attends. Rebecca Lynne Shaw was the First Flight Officer, and at the young age of 24, she too lost her life in the Buffalo plane crash. I'm picking out the 24 year olds because my oldest son is 24.

Two members of Chuck Mangione's band were in the plane. My father was a band teacher (Mr. Sadlo - Lockport Senior High School if anyone remembers!) and a trumpet player (and every other instrument in the world) and met Chuck Mangione in person. I can still picture the photograph in my mind. (I used to sort of kinda' play trumpet in high school..not sure if it was considered playing or making noise...). The Chuck Mangione band was on their way to play with the Buffalo Philarmonic Orchestra. How sad for Mr. Mangione.

With all the musicians that have died in plane crashes, I imagine many of them must think about having a similar fate. List Universe has a list of their pick of the Top Ten Musicians who have died in a plane crash. Buddy Holly is of course, first. A few of my favorites are on the list (don't laugh), John Denver (I used think he was sooo cute), Jim Croce (had the 8-track), and (a little more with the times) Stevie Ray Vaughan. My boyfriend still pines over Patsy Cline and insists Ricky Nelson is what a good lookin' guy should look like. Otis Redding (in my book) is right up there with Buddy Holly. (I just learned that Otis Redding wrote the words to the song RESPECT sung by Aretha Franklin.)

The "Elvis Pelvis" website has short biographies of musicians who have died in plane crashes.

Wikipedia (of course) has a list of "well-known" people who have died in plane crashes (or, "aviation crashes" - probably some helicopters thrown in there...)

Nationmaster always has great statistics, and they too have a list of people who have died in plane crashes.

NBC Sports has a list of athletes, sports professionals, coaches and officals who have died in plane crashes, and ESPN has a similiar lists of athletes and sport teams who have died in plane crashes.

Buffalo's TV station, WGRZ has a touching slideshow and list of everyone who died in the Buffalo plane crash.

Here is Continental Airlines Link to News on the Continental Airlines Buffalo Plane Crash 3407.

Seems like the 1 in 34 million chance of dying from a plane crash needs to be updated.

CNN has a list of articles on the Federal Aviation Administration. I bet they've got a lot of explaining to do lately. I think the words "outsourcing" came up a couple times.

CNN also has over 70 stories which reference the National Transportation Safety Board, which of course includes articles on the Buffalo plane crash.

Why do some live and some die?

On January 27, 2009 a Fedex Cargo plane crash in Texas left only minor injuries.

All but but four people died in a plane crash in Brazil the same week as the Buffalo plane crash. One of the survivor's was a nine year old.

Also within the first two weeks of February, six Americans are missing from a plane crash in Puerto Rico.

A similar Continental plane on the same New Jersey to Buffalo, NY route didn't crash in Buffalo.

Thankfully, the Pilot in the NY Hudson River plane crash played with gliders. I have to buy my daughter a few.

Here's a list to some online airline, aviation and plane crash magazines. I'm sure there's many stories of plane crashes hidden deep within these pages.

Thirty Thousand Feet refers to themselves as an "aviation directory" and that's exactly what they are. This resourceful website has links to aviation history, airport and cargo information, airline and airport topics, aviation maintenance magazines, and even aircraft and control magazines. Many of these may be paid only, but I'm sure there's some very useful links to free online information on plane crashes, plane maintenance and all the ins and outs of flying.

If you're into fixing planes, there's Aircraft Maintenance Technology magazine and website. Hmmm....one of the articles is on the need for aircraft technicians and engineers...I wonder why...

Historic Wings has some vintage plane photos and looks like they even have a free desktop or screensaver with historical planes.

In Flight USA magazine has a few aviation articles - looks like primarily California flight information. I don't know exactly, but their links to more aviation and flight information has a nice sampling of probably useful links if you're doing airline, airplane or aviation research.

Aviation Week is full of news in the aviation industry, Pilot's Web isn't as official looking, but has links to articles and other useful information.

Aviation Safety Magazine

Federal Aviation Industry News

Aero.com has a list of paid aerospace magazines - but I'm sure many of these have online content as well.

Aviation Week looks like a reputable source for news and aviation industry information.

AV Web Independent Aviation News looks like a good source, but had to close the window quickly since my darling daughter has walked in. But they have a new article on the Buffalo plane crash so if you're looking for mechanical technicalities check it out. I've kept my daughter shielded from the Buffalo Plane Crash because - well- I'll never get any sleep. Had she bought into the logic of only 1 in 34 million people die in a plane crash then saw a plane crash near her Grandpa's house....geezsh - can't even imagine. Logic doesn't work. Statistics don't work. Faith is really the only thing that works. But even Faith is questionable at times.

Okay, she's occupied making a mess with flour and water...don't ask..Here's what AV Web reported:

The crew of the Bombardier Q400 that crashed in Buffalo on Thursday got a stall warning and the stick pusher engaged but still the aircraft pitched upward 31 degrees before turning almost 180 degrees and dropping onto a house in the Buffalo suburb of Clarence Center, near the outer marker for Buffalo Niagara International Airport. The sequence of events, which included a 45-degree dive with a 106-degree right bank ended 26 seconds later in the fireball on the ground, killing 49 people on the plane and one on the ground, the owner of the house. Although icing continues as a theme in the investigation, reporters were told at an NTSB press briefing on Sunday that the aircraft's anti-icing system had been on for most of the flight and, while both pilots discussed the "significant" icing their aircraft was experiencing, at no time did they use the "severe icing" descriptor that is the official notification of flight-threatening buildup. "We don't know that it was severe icing," NTSB member Steve Chealander told reporters. "They [the crew] didn't say that it was severe icing....The weatherman didn't say that it was severe icing."

Something to do with angles...or was that angels...but definitely a site to visit for more info on the Buffalo plane crash.

I have to wrap things up for the night. I was really hoping to do a blog post on birds and planes a month ago...I'd rather talk about dying birds than dying people...

Gotta get to bed. I will cherish that I can kiss my daughter tonight. My heart goes out to all those who lost a loved one in the Buffalo plane crash - or any plane crash, and everyone who ever lost someone they love.

Teenage Pregnancy and TV

2009-02-12T00:38:00.003-05:00

Journal of Pediatrics report that teens watching Sex in the City are twice as likely to get pregnant - or become a father. (Okay, I summarized it poorly but I'm rushing... .)

Link to Article on Teen Pregnancy and Watching Sex in the City

Now all we have to do is go back to all the statistics in the last decade and account for what the kids and teens were watching on TV. Glad I threw mine out decades ago. For the record, I've never watched the show so I really have no idea how "sexual" it is.

I don't have time to write and I'm in the middle of biting off more than I can chew - but it seems to me that studies like these have tremendous power to lessen the impact of other studies.

Back to work...my poor long lost blog...

P.S. Found an old Report to the Kaiser Foundation on TV, Children, Influence, Media, History, and other studies on the effect of TV on teens and children with a lot of citations for further research:

Cached Version of
Report to the Kaiser Foundation Measuring the Effects of Sexual Content in the Media

DOC Version of Same File
Report to the Kaiser Foundation Measuring the Effects of Sexual Content in the Media

Holiday Statistics and Links to More Holiday Statistics

2008-12-28T19:24:00.011-05:00

The holiday season is almost over. I hope everyone had some joyous heartwarming moments during the last few busy weeks. My heart was overjoyed when my beautiful twenty-two year old daughter surprised me by coming up for Christmas after previously telling me she couldn't make it. (Everyone knew about it but me and my eight year old!) I hadn't seen her for a year, which was the longest we've ever gone from seeing each other. It was a comforting and teary-eyed reunion. I don't know what I'm going to do when all of the kids are off and on their own! Right now it's 3 down, 3 to go – and the first of the last three is a senior, so she'll be off experiencing life on her own later this year.

Statistics on holidays indicate there are likely heartwarming (or teeth-gritting) family reunions taking place around the nation during the November and December holiday season. The Bureau of Transportation Statistics reports (with little surprise) that November and December are the most popular months for long distance travel. I did find it a little surprising though that the Bureau's holiday statistics reported that 91% of the holiday travel was done by a “personal vehicle” (typically a car, although I suppose somebody somewhere is flying their own personal jet home for the holidays). The BTS's holiday statistics also stated that people will drive a little farther at Christmas. The average trip for Thanksgiving is around 214 miles, whereas the average trip for Christmas is around 275 miles. My daughter drove from Virginia to New York, so her trip was a wee bit farther than the average.

We had a turkey dinner on Christmas Eve. I should say we had a Thanksgiving dinner on Christmas Eve. We ate one of the 271 million turkeys that are raised in the US, according to the US Census Bureau. It's pretty much picked apart by now, despite my vegetarian seventeen year old daughter passing on her turkey portions. I'm not even sure if I have enough to make turkey soup. At least I'll get some broth out of it.

We also had a couple cans of the 649 million pounds of cranberries that are produced in the nation according to the Census Bureau's Thanksgiving Day Special Feature Report. (Some people watch special features on TV, us statistic junkies read special features from government statistical agencies or Swivel holiday statistics.) I couldn't find any fresh cranberries when I went shopping, so had to settle for canned. And there's one more statistic on cranberries that I bet you didn't know. There were 8 census designated areas (town, city, etc.) with the name Cranberry, or a spelling of the same sound (Cranbury) in 2003 – and only one with the name Pilgrim. What's confusing is the Census Bureau's 2008 reported listed there were only five places with the name Cranberry. What happened to the other three? I bet nobody discussed that at their Christmas Eve dinner. (Except maybe the person that chose to look up that statistics for the holiday report.) If I were living in Cranberry I might be worried about the fact that almost half the towns with my namesake disappearing.

If you just can't wait to hear more on holiday statistics, pay a visit to the Census Bureau website. The Census Bureau has special reports and links to facts and statistics on holidays at their Facts & Features Special Editions Page. If you're into retail or e-commerce, the feature's page includes holiday statistics on retail sales, shopping, e-commerce and other frequently sought statistics. It's convenient to start your holiday statistics research on the Facts and Features page because each item has a direct link to their source, which can provide you with more detailed information.

If you're interested in international holiday statistics, check out the World Tourism Organization website and do a search for “holidays” in their website's search engine. You can also do a search for holidays (or any other search term for statistics) at the search engine on this blog, and it will only search websites that have have statistics.

The Intute website has a tremendous collection of links to statistics on holidays. They have a fantastic search engine that searches reputable journals, websites with statistics, and thousands of resources from major universities. They have links to hundreds of national and international tourism statistics and holiday statistics, including some international holiday statistics on consumer spending and economics from the Euromonitor International Website and Ecoholidaying and the effects of tourism.

The UK's Office of National Statistics also has data and statistics on holidays in the UK as well as international holiday travel statistics. If you're into UK holiday data, check out Seaside History for historical data on UK holiday vacations at the seaside from the 1950s to the early 21st century. You'll find historical data on waterfront vacations, holiday accommodations and holiday travel and transportation in the UK. The Virtual Library of Useful URL's has links in their social sceince category that have statistics on holidays, as well as histories and general knowledge of national and international holidays. There are quite a few links, so just do a Ctrl F (or Edit Find) on the page for "holiday" to see all of the listings on holidays and statistics on holidays.

Along with all these heartwarming holiday reunions are billions of holiday greeting cards traveling from crowded greeting card display units to the hands of friends and families around the world. Hallmark's corporate website has holiday statistics on (what else?) greeting cards which include the statistic that 2.1 billion Christmas Cards are purchased for Christmas. But are they actually mailed out? I couldn't even begin to tell you how many years I bought Christmas cards and never got around to mailing them. And what about e-cards?

The United States Postal Service has a webpage on USPS statistics, facts and trivia. The Census Bureau reports that the USPS reports that about 20 billion pieces of mail go out between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and about one million packages get mailed during the holiday season. Wonder how many letters are addressed to the North Pole? This brings to mind Miracle on 34th Street, my 8 year old's favorite Christmas movie (B&W), and the scene where they dumped all the letters to Santa on the judge's desk. I love that movie. If you really want to know what's going on at the post office, you can take a look at the 2008 Comprehensive Statement of Postal Services. If you really want to. Which, you probably don't. (Link is to cached version, PDF version is available.)

If you want to plan a day to watch movies instead of reviewing post office holiday operations, you can get an idea of when Federal Holidays are scheduled by visiting the US Office of Personnel Management. They have a list of Federal Holidays for 2009 and other upcoming years. If you live in Washington D.C. you'll have off for inauguration day! (Wouldn't they require more staff?) DMOZ has lots of links to Calendars and Holidays, Wikipedia has a list of holidays by country, and the International Bank Holidays website has holidays lists up to the year 2050, and even in a visual map form. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has started putting out a yearly National Compensation Survey, which includes holiday benefit statistics and data from private and public employers.

There is a substantial amount of data in tables that can give you statistics on wages and holiday pay, retirement benefits, sick pay, health benefits, and more by industry, sector, size, and other standard BLS and Census categories. If you want to see if your holiday pay is par for your industry - the Compensation Survey is the place to check. They also have a search engine that searches only compensation data. At the top of my BTS compensation search for holidays was the result that clearly states "Contrary to popular beliefs, employers are not obligated under Federal laws to grant paid holiday benefits to their employees." Bummers. Thankfully, the majority of employers in the US do provide holiday pay - although I do have to say our benefits have a long way to go to catch up with the rest of the civilized world.

So much for a short post on holiday statistics. I hope all my readers can soak up some holiday rest before they head out into the New Year. With a lively new president, we'll be bringing in an exciting new year. Merry Chirstmas and Happy Holidays to all - and to all a good night. (Now I can go find out what happened to the Cranberries!)

Statistic Resources on Children with Aids for World Aids Day

2008-12-01T11:10:00.007-05:00

Statistics on Children with Aids are slowly surfacing as the Aids epidemic passes down through the generations. One of the primary locations for research on AIDS with recent statistics and information on Aids is at the United Nations Aids website, UNAIDS.ORG. This website has information on the latest research, statistics, graphs, tables, Excel formatted data, charts and international Aids information. There is a free pdf download of UNAIDS 2008 Global Report on Aids, with a link to a jpg wall chart demonstrating the prevalence of Aids by country on the same page.

UNICEF has produced one of the most notable reports on children with Aids. The Children and AIDS: Third Stocktaking Report, 2008 is a free pdf download available on the UNICEF and UNAIDS websites. UNICEF has a short article on the Children and Aids report which lists some highlights and findings on transmission of AIDS to children, awareness and prevention, and statistics on treatment.

International Aids statisticians and medical experts agree that early treatment of Aids in children significantly increases the chances of survival. The Children and Aids report lists a study on Antiretroviral Therapy which demonstrated that treatment of AIDS in the first 12 weeks of a child's life reduces mortality by around 76%.

The US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) reported on November 19, 2008 a landmark study that further confirmed early treatment can reverse a child's death sentence with AIDS. In this New England Journal reported study, it was discovered that infants with HIV who received Antiretroviral Therapy at an average age of seven weeks increased their chances of living, and the HIV infected infants were "four times less likely to die in the next 48 weeks" when compared to waiting until the symptoms of HIV surfaced.

The NIAID also has an informative page on HIV, Aids and Infants with a summary of treatment and statistics from 2004. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention in the US has a page with statistics and research on mother to child Aids transmission. Fortunately, it demonstrates that transmission has be reduced with increased treatment of Aids during pregnancy. They also have graphs on the state of HIV/Aids as defined by several categories, and a separate page on graphs with teenage Aids statistics. The National Institute of Health has a branch for Pediatric, Adolescent & Maternal AIDS.

Unfortunately, the majority of women do not get tested for Aids during pregnancy and statistics are showing that 25% of pregnant women who have Aids are unaware that they carry the disease. The Children and Aids report also indicated that children from an AIDS household were often not tested until they were two months old. Awareness and availability of AIDS therapies and medications will determine which child lives and which child dies.

US Aid reports that 90 percent of the 5.1 million people in India with HIV/AIDS don't know about their status until a crisis occur. A Times of India November 2008 article on Aids and Children lists some very grim statistics for children with Aids in India.

Paediatrician Sanjay Lalwani, head of the department of paediatrics, Bharati Hospital and Research Centre, says 10 to 15 per cent of children who get the infection from their mothers die within the first two years. Eighty to 85 per cent of them develop AIDS between the ages of five and seven and die.

The progression from HIV infection to AIDS can be prevented by treating these children with anti-HIV drugs (anti-retroviral therapy) when their immune system starts deteriorating. "The treatment may not be of much help if you start it at late stage of infection. At present, the government of India gives the drugs only to those children in the later stages of HIV infection," said Oswal.

The article lists AIDS statistics from the World Health Organization, and expresses the need for treatment with a listing of Aids Clinics and Aids care facilities that are available for children in India with Aids. The World Health Organization also has a page dedicated to information on children with Aids which has many pdf files, Aids treatment research, tables and graphs with statistics available in a free download.

Children with Aids have many faces. UNICEF has a Voices of Youth page. There is a YouthAids website that has Aids statistics on youth and Aids as well as general Aids statistics. The Global Ministries at The United Methodist Church has personal stories from HIV infected individuals and those suffering from AIDS. The Children with Aids Project seeks to find homes for children with AIDS and raise money for the orphans of Aids. National Public Radio has an audio broadcast from a 14 year old with Aids.

BBC reported in an article on 40 children contracting Aids in a hospital in Uzbekistan that "The United Nations says Central Asia has one of the world's fastest-growing HIV infection rates" and "Unsafe blood supplies and contaminated equipment are often blamed for spreading the infection." CNN did an indepth study on AIDS in the early 21st century, and there are many valuable historical facts on AIDS as well images, graphs and personal stories at their website. A 2006 BBC article examined how AIDS affects the workforce in Africa. This has a link to a BBC bar graph on Aids statistics around the world.

The Health Resources and Services Administration’s Maternal and Child Health Bureau (MCHB) has a bar graph on the transmission methods of Aids to children under 13 in the US according to race. The chart is slightly outdated, as it is from 2004. Nationmaster is always good for statistics on just about anything, and they have an easy bar graph to follow which reports children living with AIDS by country.

The Stolen Childhood blog, which lists international issues and global statistics on many health, drug and crime issues that are tragic to the livelihood of children, has a post on Aids and Kenya from 2007. The UC Atlas of Global Inequality from the University of California has a link to charts, graphs and maps on children and Aids. However, be aware that the page on children and Aids has not been updated since 2006. The website however, is rich with information, statistics, whitepapers, information on conferences and links to rich resources of global statistics.

Swivel is great for finding graphs and charts, and if you need more statistics on Aids, a search for AIDS at Swivel will bring a couple pages of results about Aids statistics. Some statistics on Aids in the United States by State can be found at State Health Facts website, which offers links to many statistics on health topics, including demographics and health indicators.

The US Department of Health and Human Services has a Fact Sheet on Aids, The US Government also has an HIV/AIDS website at AIDS.GOV which has links to preventative literature and statistics on some US prevention efforts, location of HIV testing sites, and research on clinical studies. There is also a link to a list of funding agencies and programs for Aids, an Aids Youth Fact Sheet, and a nice list of Aids Agencies and Programs.

Statistics on Aids can be found on millions of websites. However, if you are doing research and are looking for accurate figures on Aids and Youth and Children, keep in mind that "youth" and "children" are often defined by different age groups. The age 15 has been included in children, youth and adult statistics on Aids.

Educating and providing early treatment to women and infants with Aids can drive the mortality statistics on children and Aids on a sharp down curve. Keeping our future generations free from Aids by providing education and early treatment of pregnant women and infants will put a stop to its generational growth. Who knows? One of the lives that are saved could be the life that finds a cure for Aids and ends the deadly disease for all future generations.

Mesothelioma and Cancer Links to Statistics and Clinical Trials

2008-11-15T17:32:00.008-05:00

Mesothelioma, which often follows asbestosis, is rare. But since I have a writing assignment on these topics, I thought I’d share some websites. I really wanted to do a post on refugees – and still have it planned for the future – but I’ll need more time. Since I had an electric problem in the house that led to living over a week with no electricity and some overdue deadlines, I had to force myself to skip my blog writing. I found it interesting that while I was gone my blog post on Plane Crash Statistics was the most popular post. Kinda wish the people were searching for ways to stop world poverty instead. And I wish this war in Congo would stop. Every time I read articles on refugee children and orphaned babies I want to cry.

Back in the US, and other areas of the world, some of the older folks are suffering from a cancer called mesothelioma. Mesothelioma is caused from exposure to asbestos, although cases have been reported where asbestos exposure wasn’t evident. Asbestos use has not been eliminated, but it is subject to regulations in the US and many parts of the world. Unfortunately, there are many countries that have not yet regulated its use. The statistics for mesothelioma are grim, and survival is usually estimated to be less than a year after diagnosis. But there are survivors and stories of hope and survivors. Clinical trials, persistent research, and ignoring statistics seem to be the secret to mesothelioma survival. In the hopes of helping someone find treatment, I'm going to end this short post with some links that will help in a search for a clinical trial. Time is short. The faster people can find information for help, the greater the possibility of a cure.

If you're worried about asbestos in your home, You can easily order an Asbestos Test Kit to test for asbestos in your home. This at-home asbestos kit is under $10.00, and only costs $20.00 to get test results that meet (and exceed) EPA standards using the latest polarized light microscopy. A home mold testing kit is available for the same price, as are other home health hazard kits that can notify you of harmful invisible dangers in your home. Each of these test at home kits are far cheaper than the hundreds of dollars it would cost to have an inspector investigate your home (plus their laboratory fees) - yet all testing follows the same EPA standards.

Do you know someone who has had mesothelioma? There might be compensation available through a Mesothelioma trust fund. You can also help them find clinical trials for treatment.

Please forward these links to anyone who might be suffering from mesothelioma, asbestosis, or any type of cancer. The secret to successful treatment might just be hidden inside one of these links.

Clinical Trials.Gov
Clinical trials in the US and around the world.

CenterWatch
Clinical Trial Listing Service.

National Cancer Institute
Search box for clinical trials all cancers.

Cancer Centers
Link from Asbestos.com to Cancer Centers.

OncoLink.Org Clinical Trial Search
From the Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvannia

Onco Treatment Matching Service
Get some help finding clinical trials.

NCI Resources
Professional Information on Treatment Studies.
Links from OncoLink to Global Services
Find trials around the world.

Cancerguide.org
List of Clinical Trial Websites for Many Cancers. US and Global Links.

EORTC
European Organisation for Treatment of Cancer.

Asbestos Cancer Online
Very nice list of websites for mesothelioma clinical trials.

Mesothelioma Research Institute of America
Many mesothelioma links and clinical trial openings and results.

Statistics and Advice on Mesothelioma
Clinical Trial Link email addresses (from 2005 - may be outdated).

Mesothelioma Information and Research Group
Very nice list of clinical trial contacts and resources.

Mesothelioma on the Web
Current clinical trials, clinical trial information and mesothelioma information and resources.

Flinders University
Australian resources for clinical trials.

Prevent Mesothelioma
List of clinical trial resources with addresses and contacts (no direct links - but still valuable if current).

Mayo Clinic
Mesothelioma clinical trials at the Mayo Clinic.

University of California Clinical Trials
Clinical trials at this university.

University of Texas Medical Library
List of Clinical Trial Websites (some are listed here).

There's going to be a lot of repeats within these lists - but each link leads to more links - and hopefully the links will lead to a cure.

International Relief and International Humanitarian Aid Resources and Statistics

2008-10-15T23:34:00.001-04:00

International Relief and International Humanitarian Aid Resources and Statistics

Statistics on world disasters, hunger, health, disease and crime are staggering. Poverty is the toxic element that is infused into all humanitarian catastrophic misfortunes. Poverty ignites and is ignited by natural and intentional human indecencies and nature's wrath. Governments of many nations continue to offer financial aid to relief efforts, but politics often put basic human needs such as food and shelter on the back burner, while strategized political gain continues to roast into a succulent greedy feast. When economies fail, international relief serving those who are far worse off than the statured decision makers is discontinued. Funding remains to be decided by the face of a dollar sign, rather than the face of a poverty-stricken child, a homeless family, or a disease-ridden village. Fortunately, all faces of devastation are not dismissed nor forgotten.

The faces of those struck with the toxic energies of Poverty live constantly in the minds of International Relief Workers and Humanitarian Aid Workers around the world that trudge on inspired, exhausted and determined. Where the governments fails, International Relief Workers, Humanitarian Aid Workers and Private Humanitarian Agencies embark on missions for individual and group fundraising to raise money for transportation, medical costs, housing, food, and shelter. Their funding efforts send them far away to the isles of Affliction, Corruptness, and Desperation that suffer from the epidemics of Poverty.

Where governments fail, people must not fail. Those of us not capable of administering medicines, building houses, training and educating the uneducated, traveling to remote areas, and caring for dying babies in their arms, need to support those that are. A volunteer International Relief Worker or Humanitarian Aid Worker does not receive a pass for a free around-the world trip. They must pay for their desire to help the devastated. Even those who receive a small compensation from a private funding source must still fund their own traveling expenses.

During times of economic crisis, private funding deteriorates, and individuals must raise money on their own to quiet the cries of the helpless that infiltrate their minds at night, while sleeping in the arms of an almost sinfully-wealthy country. These cries drive them to ask their churches, communities, businesses and educational institutions to help. It is up to us, the believers, the dreamers, the neighbors, the business owners, and the educators, to support these individuals so that they can be the link on the chain to give to others what we can't give. Only a strong chain of efforts can drag the toxic-ridden isles of poverty into a decent humanitarian state. We must all become a part of that chain.

High school students should be introduced to humanitarian efforts. Colleges, universities, and even vocational schools should invoke International Relief and Humanitarian Aid training. International majors that focus on people as well as politics need to grow exponentially. Educational institutions offering majors for International Relief are far and few between. Our educational system must step in to promote the end of global poverty and give rise to the efforts to extinguish the events that contribute to poverty's ignition.

My daughter's continuous desire to become an International Relief Worker throughout her high school years, and our trying search for information on education and careers in International Relief Work over the years, drove me to choose this topic for my blog post on Blog for Poverty Day. We can do more than contribute money, we can contribute our time. Train, educate, contribute and build a desire to help others among our young people. Teach young people the value of life, the value of living and the value of giving. As parents, educators and humans with a heart - we can all step in to build the chain to pull the toxic elements of poverty out of human existence. The chain may go on forever, but with every link, poverty's toxic elements are smothered just a little bit more.

Many websites are available to see first hand the staggering statistics. And since collecting statistics is a difficult, and almost impossible endeavor in many remote areas, these statistics, as dramatic as they are, often under-represent the realities of humanitarian needs.

One of the most noted resources for data on Global Poverty Issues is the World Bank. The World Bank Statistics Page has data on international statistics for poverty related issues, current and needed funding, trends on poverty related issues and trends on development programs. There is also a search engine query page for indepth research and an online poverty computational calculator designated as Povcal Net which can be improvised by countries. The World Bank website is a very comprehensive and reputable source for information and statistics. The World Health Report is one of their most considerable publications.

The World Food Programme website, the World Health Organization with numerous health statistics on international issues, Doctors Without Borders, Oxfam, and
UNICEF, need little introduction and are primary sources for research and statistics on international statistics on poverty and global issues. On a smaller scale is US Aid, an independent US government website with information on budget for foreign assistance programs funded by the United States and US Overseas Loans and Grants. There is also a page on Missions of US Aid.

Disaster areas are often recipients of international funding. There are many websites available for research on disaster funding, histories, trends, costs, causes and effects. The International Strategy for Disaster Reduction has detailed data on the impact of natural disasters for many countries throughout the years. The Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder has a list of links to statistics on natural disasters, including many valuable government resources for information and statistics. This is a must visit website for substantive research on natural disasters. If you're looking for some global play-by-play disaster reports by month or year, check out the NCDC (National Climatic Data Center). NASA is has astronomical amounts of information on disasters and shouldn't be left out of the list of resources. The Asian Disaster Reduction Center has several pdf downloads on disaster statistics and analysis.

Talking ITGlobal Issues Page is not limited to IT issues, in fact, it is a non-profit website that promotes global issues to youth, and even includes a page on educational games for global issues. I haven't tried any of these yet but I'll definitely pay a visit later. Educational games on peace and global issues aren't easy to find!

I haven't compiled a list of universities and colleges that offer International and Humanitarian majors, (not merely courses), but it's on my list of things to do. But there are some great websites for teenagers and young adults (and their parents and counselors of course!) to examine as they explore their career options. Many of these also include links to listings to International Jobs, International Relief Jobs, and Humanitarian Aid Jobs around the world.

The United Nations has a page dedicated to United Nations Volunteer ism, and a Fact Sheet on UN Volunteers and a Poverty Network Web Portal if you're interested in including your website.

The Human Rights Interactive Network has a long list of links from around the world on current news, newspapers, journals and websites related to human rights. I just took a look at the All Africa website since my daughter is interested in International Relief work in Africa, and it's a wonderful news and research resource information on current events and even statistics. Unfortunately, its "premium search engine" is only available at a price. However, it does provide many other sources for information. When I was doing research for my daughter I stumbled on the UN's Africa Renewal Online Magazine, formerly called "Africa Recovery." (The new name does sound more optimistic doesn't it?) I really enjoyed reading it, and it's a wonderful source for current news and renewal efforts in Africa. UNICEF has a pdf file on Central Africa statistics and relief efforts. (1 in 5 die before their fifth birthday is particularly disheartening.)

Blogspot blogs get in on the action in Africa too. The Business Action for Africa blog is a blog to subscribe to if you're interested in humanitarian efforts in Africa, or have business connections willing to work for Africa, or are lucky enough to be in a position to recommend business action opportunities. This is a professional business networking website with many valuable links and references. There is also a social networking website for Businesses Fight Poverty around the world.

This group is looking for volunteers to help deaf children in Africa if anyone is interested! The ad is posted in the website Network Learning, which has nothing to do with digital networks, but networking for humanitarian aid. There are many free pdf files, career advice, and links for humanitarian aid career, learning, and organizational development and fundraising information. Network Learning is non-profit and has a vast array of information for NGO's. But I still haven't figured out what NGO stands for. I'll have to look it up when I'm done. But if you know what it is - pay a visit to Network Learning.

The website Aid Workers Network is another non-profit website for Humanitarian Aid Workers with career advice for Humanitarian Careers. I received a wonderful pdf file for my daughter from Dr. Bryan Walker, whose two sons are international humanitarian workers. The 83 page pdf file is entitled "Better Ways to Find Humanitarian Employment" and has too many valuable links and statistics to mention. Dr. Walker has extensive experience in humanitarian aid. His free pdf book is a fluent read despite being chock full of valuable information, and can be downloaded at this link at the Network Learning Website. If anyone can upload this document to encourage humanitarian workers, Dr. Bryan Walker can be contacted at this address on the Aidworkers Network. I would also encourage high schools and guidance offices to promote this career advice to students interested in International Work. As Dr. Walker stated in his email, "There are many people who struggle to get into humanitarian work so the more opportunities for readership, the better." This pdf also includes a case history from his son now in the DR Congo with the International Rescue Committee. I really enjoyed the read, but my daughter has to finish her research paper on the death penalty before she can get around to it. Maybe her and I with gather up the youngest and head overseas after the rest of the clan are settled...

Career resources also exist at this US Aid page on Careers, and this free pdf on Private Volunteer Agencies and Opportunities for Humanitarian Aid and International Relief. Relief Net is still my favorite resource after all of my investigations. It includes interactive maps, professional resources, International Relief Job and Humanitarian Aid Positions available, (including descriptions), data, statistics, and more. This is positively one of the best networks to use if you begin a quest for information on international humanitarian relief work.

I've been lucky my youngest is entranced with Magic School Bus, and I could go on forever with this post, but it's time to make dinner or lunch or whatever it is we're eating now. (I like to avoid mirrors, calendars and clocks!) And, I think Blog for Poverty Day is almost over! Eeek...I've never been on time for anything.

Enjoy the day, enjoy your life, and build a little link to help end global poverty.

Plane Crash Statistics

2008-09-27T14:06:00.010-04:00

Plane crash statistics isn't a very popular topic, but since I've collected some data and posted some of it in Wiki Answers, I might as well throw the links to statistics up here and in my search engine.

What possessed me to start digging for plane crash statistics? My 8 year old daughter has had this fear for the last three weeks that a plane will fall and crash into our house. Her prayers now include "Dear God, please don't let a plane fall on our house - and if it does can me and mom (and sisters, brothers, dogs, cats, guinea pigs) all go to heaven at the same time?" This is my daredevil daughter that has spent her walking years (she skipped crawling) climbing and jumping from anything and everything she could. (No broken legs yet - thank God.)

Personally, I could use a new roof. So if the plane crashes and we're not home and I can get a new roof out of the deal - all the better for me. I suggested that to her but it didn't help make her feel better. I just got the evil eye. I tried to explain statistics and probability - comparing it to the lottery - but failed miserably. So, we went on the web and looked for plane crash statistics (surfing very carefully so I didn't land on any pages with plane crash images).

One of the first statistics I found was that there is a 1 in 34,000,000 chance of dying from a plane while being on the ground. I tried explaining probability again. It still didn't work. I even exaggerated.

Mom: "Well, out of all the people in the US, only one will probably die from a plane while on the ground." (I said I exaggerated.)

Daughter: Gasp! "You mean someone in the US will die from a plane!"

Sigh. We found out that it is safer for her to fly in a plane than it is for her to ride her bike. (And she LOVES riding her bike.) It helped a little. Now she's worried about a propeller falling off the plane or an engine blowing up. But, the bicycle fact keeps nudging her back to rationalization. But they are little tiny nudges that always seem to get pushed back even harder.

Out of sheer helplessness, I've emailed my sister who used to work at Boeing. (But now teaches tenth graders how to make paper airplanes.) Maybe she can tell us the strength of the Krazy Glue they use on the propellers. (Still waiting to hear from her.)

I did learn the best way to search for statistics on plane crashes is to search for statistics on "aviation" rather than plane or airplane.

So how many plane crashes happen every year? The closest figure I got was a US figure of about 36 crashes per year based on the National Transportation and Safety Bureau (NTSB) figures from 1988 - 2007. The NTSB Aviation Page has links to information on investigations and statistics, and their Accident Database has a search engine for detailed accident querys. They also have a link for data and tables on airplane Accidents, Fatalities and Rates. I guess it's no surprise Alaska has some of the highest plane accident rates. Wonder if Sarah flies?

The first statistics I found were from PBS's Nova. PBS has a chart on Commercial Airpcraft Fatalities from 1982-2005. Their article "How Risky is Flying" is where I found the statistics comparing bicyles to planes (and cars and trains - no horses though). Some comparative statistics:

The annual risk of being killed in a plane crash for the average American is about 1 in 11 million.

...the annual risk of being killed in a motor vehicle crash for the average American, which is about 1 in 5,000.

...the likelihood of dying from heart disease is much higher (1 in 400 per year, for the average American.)

Eight year olds don't really think about dying from heart disease though. Of course, most eight year olds don't think about dying from a plane falling into their house either.

Using the search engine on my blog I was also able to find statistics from the Census Department and Bureau of Labor Statistics on fatality statistics from plane crashes per industry.

Wikipedia has an entry on plane crashes, and I also just recently (like a couple seconds ago) found this Wiki on Aircrafts that I'll have to take a look at more thoroughly.

The Horace Mann Reach Every Child website has Lots of Educational Links to Resources on Airplanes for all ages, and I also stumbled on this comprehensive list of links to Aviation Sites that must have taken a great deal of time to put together.

The Airline Pilots Association has their own website, and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has a lot to say about airplane safety. Hmmm...maybe she should write them a letter. Great homework assignment. Doesn't seem to be good timing to write the President now anyhow. I don't see anything on their HELP webpage about how to convince an 8 year old a plane isn't going to fall on the house.

Maybe if she's in the air instead of the ground she won't worry about it so much. Maybe she could start training for her pilot's license. Then she'll be in control instead of her imagination.

Links to Federal Statistics on Economics from the US Government

2008-09-18T12:04:00.007-04:00

The economy is a hot topic in the US - although for me it's more like the country song that sings "Wall Street fell but we were so poor we couldn't tell..." - so I'm really not stressing over the avalanche of crumbling corporations that are filling the avenues of Wall Street.

I've been involved in some articles and research on Internet Piracy and am now addicted to the topic. This blog post was going to be about Internet Piracy - but time is lacking and the research I've collected is overwhelming me now. (But I can't wait to start ranting on the manipulated statistics that the RIAA is putting out and the international bullying that the US Government has been rightly accused of.) As I was browsing this morning I came across some government links that might help someone looking for some offical data on US Economics, the Federal Reserve and all that fun stuff. So, in the spirit of sharing - I do now share:

The Economic Report of the President

"The Economic Report of the President is an annual report written by the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors. It overviews the nation's economic progress using text and extensive data appendices."

Federal Reserve System Website

From their website: "...provides the nation with a safe, flexible and stable monetary and financial system." That's not what I hear on Wall Street. (Is anyone laughing as hard as I am?)

Federal Reserve Board - 12 Districts

"The Federal Reserve officially identifies Districts by number and Reserve Bank city. In the 12th District, the Seattle Branch serves Alaska, and the San Francisco Bank serves Hawaii. The System serves commonwealths and territories as follows: the New York Bank serves the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands; the San Francisco Bank serves American Samoa, Guam, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. The Board of Governors revised the branch boundaries of the System in February 1996." Click on the map to enter the website for the individual district.

Department of Energy Price Trends

Includes links to statistics and data on petroleum, gas, diesel, historical energy data and current gas price information.

List of Department of Energy Stakeholders

Includes links to State Energy Websites and Economic Dispatch Reports.

Federal Housing Administration

Mortgage and foreclosure information.

Budget of the United States Government

Ya. Right.

Search Engine Catalog for US Government Publications

You can search by keyword through federal depositories. I did a search for "statistics economics" and there were over 15,000 results.

Search for Economic Indicator Information by Year

"Available from April 1995 forward, this monthly compilation is prepared for the Joint Economic Committee by the Council of Economic Advisors and provides economic information on prices, wages, production, business activity, purchasing power, credit, money and Federal finance." I tested it out and there are plenty of government statistics available in handy dandy data sets.

Energy Information Administration

For official energy statistics from the US Government.

Search Engine and Statistics from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Fransisco

Looks like a decent search engine. Links to economic and banking data and statistics.

Louisiana State University Links on Economic Statistics and Websites

List of links to economic journals and government websites (some of which I've listed in this blog).

Economagic

I don't know where this website came from - but it has links to Federal Reserve, Census and Commerce Statistics. If you need some quick details..this might be worth a look. Some of the data is arranged in timelimes. A little congested, but could be valuable nonetheless.

Which reminds me, can't forget to post the US Department of Commerce Economics link.

Tons of national and international data and statistics on commerce, exporting, importing, employment and all that commerce-y kind of stuff. Links to other US Commerce departments too.

The weather has been in the news as much as government bailouts. How about the Economic and Social Benefits of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

United Nations Economic Commission for Europe

Okay, it's not a US website - but there are a slew of statistics...

United for a Fair Economy is a non-profit organzation that supplies interesting economic data in their Executive Excess 2008 Report that dried my (absent) tears for Wall Street.

The report also finds that S&P 500 CEOs averaged $10.5 million in pay in 2007, 344 times the pay of typical American workers. Compensation levels for private investment fund managers soared even further. The top 50 hedge and private equity fund managers averaged $588 million each, more than 19,000 times as much as typical U.S. workers earned.

This report was created in collaboration with the Institute for Policy Studies. The IPS has substantial data in pdf report form on their IPA Reports link such as Analysis: U.S. Department of Energy Budget FY 2009, Debt and Trade and Challenging Corporate Investor Rule.

The ten year old website Global Issues is a rich resource for data on poverty, economics, trade, health and thousands of other topics including these (approximately) 67 links on Poverty and Economics. Okay, I admit, I'm not that poor, especially by international standards. And as long as I can pay my internet bill I'll be happy. A steady supply of coffee and chocolate is a luxury/weakness I find hard to do without. (Yes, I do try to buy Fair Trade products - but I'm in the boonies here.)

Back to the rich executives. Need market information? Okay, there's a zillion or more websites with market statistics. The Wall Street Journal has their website Market Watch which pretty much reports everything you're likely to read anywhere else anyhow.

Hope these can be of some assistance to you. These websites (and other references for statistics) are included in this blog's "Search for Statistics" search engine at the top of the page. So if you're looking for some quick statistics, it probably wouldn't hurt to do a search in our search engine first. If you need more links on energy statistics, check out our post on Oil and the Russia Georgia War.

I just read there was a rebound in the stocks. So, while you're having fun letting visions of numbers run through your head, I'll be heading off to check my virtual stocks. (They're much safer.) Have fun with your search! (And always feel free to comment if you need help finding something and maybe I can help.)

Post script September 19th 2008: Just want to add this link I just read from a DIGG submission: Salaries of Today's Wall Street CEOs.

Post script September 27th 2008: Saw this government economic analysis website that is just stuffed with statistics! It's called "Shadow Government Statistics" by John Williams. If you're looking for heavy-duty economic analysis you want to follow John's shadow!

Statistics Fraud

2008-08-30T19:50:00.006-04:00

Statistics can be manipulated - and falsified. That's exactly what happened recently in Kenya. Managers at the Department of Statistic in Kenya, Africa, falsified data on a poverty indexing report to gain federal funding. How many people will use these statistics for statistical correlations in future data never realizing that the data was falsified?

Africa isn't the only continent where the intoxication of manipulating statistics became too hard to resist. The Human Rights Statistics in China reported that the National Bureau of Statistics in China has had some of their government employees fiddling with the numbers.

Europe apparently didn't want to be left out of the numbers-playing game. Reports started back in 2003 about fraud at Eurostat, and across the ocean the United States San Francisco Health Department falsified HIV statistics.

How many statistical reports have these falsifications been innocently inoculated into?

It would be interesting to see a visual on flow of data from the reports that were falsified.

Statistics never did depict reality anyway.

Here's some links to National and International Government Statistic Agencies:

United Nations Statistic Division

International Statistical Agencies listing from the US Census Bureau

Department of Labor Statistical Websites Around the World

You can't always trust the government and you can't always believe what you read. As if we didn't already know that.

Can Miss America be President?

2008-08-29T20:39:00.007-04:00

Can Miss America Be President?

Beauty pageant camaraderie is similar to the "good 'ol boys" network. Appearances and connections get you ahead. Sarah Palin may well be on her way to giving Miss America pageants some more credibility. Maybe the "good 'ol boys’ network" will realize "beauty" and "intelligence" can exist in one body.

The good 'ol boys might think the country is lowering its standards - but perhaps we are gradually opening our eyes to a new way of thinking. Kennedy, Ferraro, Hillary, Obama - and hopefully Palin - will give credence to the virtue of potential and the value of family.

Beauty and political networks both have their scandals. In 1957 Miss USA was dethroned because the secret-snatchers found out that she was really married and a mother of two. Maybe Palin can let beautiful people know it's okay to be a mom. Beauty and intelligence are rarely seen together. But beauty, intelligence and motherhood? It’s a media rarity. But women of that class are working hard in the hidden corners of the world. Many aren't as fortunate as us in the US and could get killed for their intelligence. Many prefer less prolific jobs than vice-president. But America and other nations are full of beautiful, intelligent mothers. Working mothers can relate to Palin.

Then there are the scandals that beauty pageant contestants and the political boys both face. More than a few have been dethroned for posing nude - although that probably is not considered humiliation these days - just a financial maneuver. The pageants have flip-flopped from swimsuits to no swimsuits and back again a few times. No wonder these beautiful women are confused.

Beauty pageants can handle the media though. In 1948 reporters protested because Miss America was in a gown instead of a swimsuit when she received her crown. The pageant tactfully conceded by allowing them to take photos of the runner-ups in swimsuits.

The most memorable clothing conflict in my time was in 1984 - the same year Sarah Palin was competing in the Miss Alaska pageant and Geraldine Ferraro was chosen as Vice President Nominee. It was also the same year I had my first son, and a year after Vanessa L. Williams was the first black to win Miss USA - and winning racist death threats along with her crown. (Who says racism doesn't exit? Whites?)

Unfortunately, Miss Vanessa Williams, much like politicians, had some secret-chasers. Posing nude for Playboy was discovered and frowned upon, and Vanessa had to step down. The runner-up, Suzzette Charles, another singer and actress, was therefore the second black holding the crown - for a record-short period of seven weeks.

Today, it's easy to witness the Miss Universe and Miss World pageants and see that race is not an issue. (Judging by looks - yes. Race - no.) Vanessa's dethroning didn't hold back her musical and acting talents. She went on the receive Emmy, Grammy and Tony award nominations and currently stars in Ugly Betty.

The first black was allowed in the Miss Universe pageant in 1959 (the year Alaska became a state), and 1960 the first black participated in the Miss USA pageant. It wasn't until 1983 that a black won. They're still far ahead of the "good 'ol boys" network though when it comes to race. Oh - and by the way - Sarah Palin was defeated by Maryline Blackburn, who is black and beautiful and now working as a professional singer.

It appears from Pageantry Magazine that most beauty pageant winners go on to media ventures, such as television, radio and music. But all that omega from fresh Alaskan fish must be working wonders in the Alaskan winners, since Wikipedia suggests that more than a few Alaskan winners went into medical fields.

Beauty pageants are an interesting way of capitalizing on human resources. The fact that the Miss America Pageant (started in 1921) was started by local businessmen to attract tourists to America isn't something I am proud of in my American history. (Oops, did I just say I wasn't proud of America?) But pageant advocates haven't been standing idly by wallowing in beautiful ignorance either. Teen drug abuse, breast and ovarian cancer, and HIV/AIDS charities receive significant help from Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA pageants. Beautiful do-gooders.

Pageant winners are, in fact, national and international ambassadors. And international conflict infiltrates beauty pageants as well as politics. The Pageant Almanac has a beauty pageant timeline of historical events that include:

1970 - Feminist protesters throw flour bombs during Miss World 1970.
1974 - Feminists protest at Miss America.
1993 - Miss USA, Kenya Moore, is booed by the Mexican audience at Miss Universe.
2002 - Miss World is slated to be held in Abuja, Nigeria. Amina Lawal, a Nigerian woman, is sentenced to death by stoning for adultery. Miss World attempted to use the publicity of the event to bring awareness to the issue. After the event's security is threatened by anti-pageant protests and riots, several contestants withdraw and the pageant is moved to London, United Kingdom.
2003 - Vida Samadzai represents Afghanistan at Miss Earth, although she resides in the United States. Her appearance in a bikini causes an uproar in her native country.
2005 - Locals in Thailand protest at Miss Universe 2005 after contestants wearing swimsuits are filmed in front of sacred monuments.
2005 - Pakistan is represented in an international pageant for the first time at Miss Earth. Her participation causes an uproar in her native country.
2007 - Miss USA, Rachel Smith, is booed by the Mexican audience at Miss Universe. Smith also falls during the evening gown competition but recovers with grace and a smile.

(The flour bombs were also referred to as smoke bombs. Women were always less violent than men.)

Are beauty pageant networks gender-biased? It certainly appears so. It wasn't until 2001 that a male participated - sort of. More specifically, it was a transsexual who almost won the honor of being of Miss Universe as a representative of China. Quickly, the rules were revised to declare the contestants must be a "natural-born woman." Similar to the president's "natural born" requirements for U.S. Presidency.

The Miss Universe motto (since 1960) is in fact:

"We, the young women of the universe, believe people everywhere are seeking peace, tolerance and mutual understanding. We pledge to spread this message in every way we can, wherever we go."

Maybe carrying that message in our hearts can make all of us beautiful inside. Carrying that message to the presidency might even make America a country to be proud of.

Statistics on Education and Statistic Websites with Search Engines

2008-08-25T10:10:00.009-04:00

The government's census website isn't the only website available to gather statistics on the U.S. and education. I stumbled on some websites today that have search engines for statistics, graphs, and all kinds of educational statistics, employment statistics, economy statistics, lifestyle statistics and more.

Since today's the first day of college for most kids (adults), I thought I'd post some links to websites and journals on education. There's millions of websites that have educational data - but these are just a few that can give someone a head start on their research:

The National Center for Educational Statistics
is a government website with a consortium of statistics on education. Fast facts ($489 billion dollars will be spent on education, enrollment is up for students under 25, over a million children are homeschooled), as well as detailed data tables and graphs are available. You will likely find the statistics you need at this website faster than the US Census website.

Today I stumbled on Statemaster.com which has educational statistics on assessments, race, gender, grade, expenditures, public libraries, and other links to economy, housing, crime, immigration, sports and a few others. (Even the presidential election.) Definitely worth a visit. Just for kicks I tried "homeschool" in their search engine and there were no results. However, the website is chock full of statistics on education and up-to-date information on today's society.

The people at Statemaster also have Nationmaster.com - a very comprehensive and useful website for educational statistics and international statistics on society. They describe themselves as:

"a massive central data source and a handy way to graphically compare nations. NationMaster is a vast compilation of data from such sources as the CIA World Factbook, UN, and OECD. Using the form above, you can generate maps and graphs on all kinds of statistics with ease."

BBC World and New York Times both paid high compliments to Nationmaster.("A statistician's dream.")

The creators of Nationmaster and Statemaster have also created some great search engines for information and statistics at Factbites and a wiki search engine that searches over multiple wikis at Qwika.

The American Educational Research Association Special Interest Group has a Long List of Free Journals on Education. EdInformatics has links to educational journals - all of them are not free access though. Still, there are a good number of quality links.

The Education Resource Information Center (ERIC) has long been one of my favorite websites to visit and is a wonderful source. Good 'ol Wikipedia even has a resource for education statistics within their listing for Free Online Journals, including Australasian Journal of Educational Technology that offers free access to all articles that are over three months old, and Educational Technology which is a free open-access journal.

And since this blog is about statistics - I can't leave out the free open-access journal of The Philosophy of Mathematics Education. Philosophy? Mathematics? Interesting combination. Here you'll find a link to Social Constructivism as a Philosophy of Mathematics: Radical Constructivism Rehabilitated.

Mathematics Teacher has very limited free access, however they do have free previews - which amount to a free download of one or two articles. This month, it's Squaring Matrics: Connecting Mathematics and Science. The articles in Mathematics Teacher are reasonably priced though. The Evolution of the Cartesian Connection by Gail M. Anderson is only $6.00 to download. (Maybe worth it if you know what a Cartesian Connection is. Let me know when you find out!)

Hope these links can help you with your quest for statistics on education. Don't forget the search engine on this blog is set up to search only websites with statistics so give that a try too! It's updated frequently - so make sure to bookmark this blog to help you with your research!

Happy Learning!

Amazon.com Widgets

Buffalo's Bash the Grass Cuts Grass and Leads to Quicksand

2008-08-21T13:52:00.008-04:00

Statistics are often muddled by city officials hoping to promote their faltering city - or themselves. (Take a look at this New York Times article on Rudolph Guiliani, Hillary and Obama for starters.) Journalists and corporate interest groups get in on the act, and before you know it, the muddled statistics are worshipped with biblical reverence. Buffalo's recent publicising on their "Quality of Life" efforts - increasing tickets on overgrown lawns, indoor furniture on outdoor porches, and unregistered vehicles in a yard - is a prime example. (Junk car removal services surely have financial interest!)

The article starts out with:

Crime in the neighborhood “took a nose dive,” said Police Commissioner H. McCarthy Gipson. Assaults, robberies, burglaries and rapes dropped by double-digit percentages last month compared with a year earlier. Motor vehicle thefts dropped 39 percent. Even larceny dropped slightly.

Mentioning only briefly

"While a special robbery detail likely contributed to the drop in crime, city officials give much of the credit to the quality-of-life squad,"

before going on and on about the benefits of ticketing people for overgrown grass. (Buffalo limits grass growth to ten inches). The "special robbery detail" isn't expounded on at all. But - giving Buffalo the benefit of the doubt (not really) - it is possible they didn't have all the statistics since apparently the mayor had to ORDER the police to give crime access data to the media.

Since I live in a safe rural area, amongst fields and unregistered cars and haven't locked my door in five years and people park in "town" with their keys in their car - I found this methodology absurd. (Long grass raising crime?) Since I am disabled and raised my kids as a single parent working full time most of their lives - I found it even more absurd. (Hmmm leave the kids alone in the house, feed the baby, or cut the lawn? Buy diapers, pay the babysitter to work, pay bills, take the kids out for ice-cream, or pay someone to cut the lawn? Ice-cream wins every time.) Looking out the window and realizing we haven't gone even a week without rain turned the absurdity turned to infuriation.

"Don't sweat the small stuff" is a mantra I've lived by long before the book came out. In fact, when I read it I thought "I already know all this." (Raising six kids you learn REAL quick not to sweat the small stuff! And sorry about the overused cliche but it's repeatedly used in the Buffalo News related articles.) I've also learned "nip it in the bud" is an equally important cliche. Are my kids going to stay away from crime if my lawn is cut? Will the kids in school stop offering them drugs if my lawn is cut?

I've seen more than a few coke-induced and alcoholic mothers with impeccable homes and yards over the years. (Outside appearances are important to police - and many of them know that.) Health, education, economy and loving relationships impact crime a hundred fold over long grass. If you want to start small - start with health, education and economy - then move to drugs. Violent crimes and murders would likely be reduced from there. Invest in free health care. Invest in education. Invest in small businesses and lower taxes. Don't add stress to struggling residents. Everybody's working for gas to get to work now. Who can afford a ticket?

Is $60 and $150 fines for grass growing more than ten inches the key to stopping crime? Crime across the nation has decreased steadily - even without intense "bash the grass" police parties. (Decrease in crime humorously correlated with an increase of wine consumption on swivel.com.)

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics property crime rates have nationally been on a steady decrease since 1993. "Property Crime" can have many definitions. But if we look at the FBI data from 2007 we see that property crime in Buffalo increased. Property crime in these sets include burglary, larceny, motor-vehicle theft and arson - exactly the crimes that the Bash the Grass (my name) Quality of Life program is meant to deter. Statistical relationships? In 2007, the same year, they bragged about "record number of tickets for Quality of Life being issued."

"Causation" and "Statistical Correlation" are two different things. Factcheck.org brings up an interesting point when considering handgun ownership to violent crimes. Statistical correlations don't take into consideration WHY a person buys a gun. A comparison of gun ownership in a rural area to crime would vary significantly from the same comparison to urban areas. Has anyone compared those who purchased a gun for hunting purposes against those who purchase guns for protection and the correlation to violent crime? (Personally, I have the Bambi syndrome and don't like guns - but they are a significant part of our constitutional rights - and you never know when you may need to exercise that right. God forbid WWIII is in the works.)

If Buffalo thinks cut lawns are going to increase newcomers to Buffalo - they have another thing coming. I would bet that people look at crime rates and educational standards before taking a ruler to the grass in the neighborhood. Buffalo wouldn't get past the crime and educational evaluations.

Looking for Outliers had a great post on Journalism and Auditors and makes a valid point that an audit can "increase public confidence." Having run my own business and being the sort of owner that keeping receipts in a shoebox would be a step up - auditors make me nervous. But "AuditorPOV" make an auditor seem - well - almost human.

Most people are smart enough not to believe everything they read. Fact-checking is a time consuming process. Journalists and auditors frequently serve the public to protect us from political and corporate influences. Unfortunately, many journalists and auditors also have political and corporate motives to manipulate information and statistics. (Hmmm, maybe I should add bloggers to that list...)

While searching for statistics, I found (surprisingly) that short search terms fared better than "long tail" search terms for statistics.

Having vented enough - and spending too much time looking at statistics I have no use for - I'll leave some links for crime statistics:

FBI Uniform Crime Reports for Nation, State and Region

Bureau of Justice Statistics

USA.gov State and Local and lots of other links!

US Census Bureau 2008 Abstract

Lots of Law and Crime Links including statutes, statistics and journals.

Listing of Encyclopedias and Links on Crime

Buffalo Fights Crime Report 2008

Mayors' Action Forum on Crime

• Buffalo, NY: Gangs are in almost every neighborhood. This has led to more violence in
schools. Youth are committing more street crimes, such as robberies and shootings.

White House Social Statistics Briefing Room

I'm not doing this list "justice" (no pun intended until after I wrote that) - but I'll keep adding to the list in the future. If you need more stats - try the search engine in this blog - it's set up to search only websites with statistics. (The database increases regularly so if you can't find the information you need now - it may be there at another date.)

Guess I'll go watch the grass grow now...

Book to for Serious Sleuths:
The Technology of Policing: Crime Mapping, Information Technology, and the Rationality of Crime Control

Or try these:

Slavery by Russia in Georgia

2008-08-16T11:13:00.009-04:00

Forced labor is just a nice word for slavery. In 1930 at a United Nations Geneva conference the International Labour Organization declared it offical that slavery includes forced labor. Today, The Jerusalem Post reported that Russia was using forced labor on ethnic Georgians to clean up the aftermath of the war. (How about - you made the mess you clean it up?)

It's common knowledge that slavery exists in the dark hidden bowels of our "civilized" world. Antislavery.org reports that in 2002

8.4 million children are in slavery, trafficking, debt bondage and other forms of forced labour, forced recruitment for armed conflict, prostitution, pornography and other illicit activities.

And forced labor?

At least 12.3 million people* around the world are
trapped in a form of slavery known as forced labour.

Now the people of Georgia can join those figures thanks to Russia.

When such a massive region of political and economic influence openly uses forced labor it's time for the world to wake up and get a grasp on humanity. Actually, we should have done that centuries ago.

I'm personally recommending Caroline Glick's article on Nature of Man and "What does Moscow Want in Georgia" by Brenda Shaffer for anyone who is interested in learning more about the Georgia Russia conflict.

Statistics prove that we haven't learned much from our uncivilized past. Will power and greed always prevail? Do only the physically strong survive - or can strength be defined by intellectual, emotional, or humanitarian strength? Right now statistics are showing that physical strength wins. I wonder when we will be "civilized" enough (or smart enough) to use brains over braun so innocent civilians, especially children, can remain unscathed from political rivalry and greed.

Post Script August 21, 2008: Just found this link with some great pdf files on international conflict by Gary King Professor of Government at Harvard University: Evidence, Theories and Legal Ramifications of International Conflict

Statistics and Information on Georgia Russia conflict and oil can also be found at my blog post on Statistics on Oil and the Nations at War.

Statistics on Oil and the Nations at War

2008-08-13T23:05:00.009-04:00

Oil and war go together like religion and war. The Georgia-Russia war is affecting some prime land for pipelines. For international energy statistics, the Global Education Project has facts, bar graphs and lots of stats on World Energy Supplies, and has an incredible amount of information on just about any physical aspect of the earth you can think of. The US has their Energy Information Administration website with "Official Energy Statistics" by the US government. And for a less biased report, BP has their "Statistical Review of World Energy". The International Energy Agency has some free statistics available for download - and some pricey statistics. You can search statistics by country at their website - and Georgia's profile offers more than a few free .pdf files with relevant data.

Where is all this leading? You can pay a visit to Earth Trends to find out. Maintained by the World Resources Institute, Earth Trends data tables identify trends in our earthly resources, including Energy and Resources. You can also review the free publications on energy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and review congressional testimonies. There's also free publications at the Centre for European Policy Studies.

The Energy Citations Database has a search engine to over 2.3 million research citations. The Information Bridge is a similar search engine, but on a broader range of topics. A search for "Georgia Russia" brought up over 1500 results, however "not available" was an attribute that was assigned to more than a few of them. Those two search engines are both gifts from the Office of Scientific and Technical Information by the US Department of Energy. They also have a Science Accelerator free to the public. Of course, don't forget Science.gov to find information from Astronomy to Zoology.

The search engine on our blog searches only websites with statistics, so you won't get bogged down with a list of stores and irrelevant results. All the websites listed above are included. Bookmark us so you can use our search engine for your research!

Now if someone could just use those statistics to lower the price of gas and end a few wars our kids would be much better off.

Post Script August 21, 2008: Statistics and theories on International Conflict and be found at Gary King Professor of Government at Harvard University: Evidence, Theories and Legal Ramifications of International Conflict

Also see my short blog post on Slavery of Georgians by Russians for more links and statistics on the Georgia Russia conflict and links to statistics on slavery.

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Religion and Politics

2008-08-12T17:43:00.008-04:00

Religion and Politics, War and Peace - Why can't we all just get along? The Russia and Georgia (the country) war is all about politics - seems to me like it's the big guy picking on the little guy. The Middle Eastern wars are without a doubt a mix of politics and religion. Found some great websites for statistics on religion and politics. Adherents has tons of religious demographic data and some interesting trivia on religion. You'll find not only the countries of origin for many world religions, but also the religious affiliations of government officials, entertainers, and Nobel Peace Prize winners. Want to compare religious statistics with politics? Head over to the White House and check out their page on Social Statistics. If you really want some juicy details, visit the Department of Justice. If want to correlate more data on refugees, head over to the University of Michigan's website on statistics. You'll also find plenty of statistics on politically popular statistics like abortion, science, segregation, terrorism, social security, education - and of course religion. They also have a wealth of data on community indicators and personal lifestyles.

Browsing Browser Statistics

2008-08-11T12:00:00.015-04:00

Reporting Statistics does hereby give thanks to Ourblogtemplates.com for providing me with a blog template that works in Firefox, Opera and Internet Explorer.

I'm an avid Opera browser fan, but according to www.w3school.com and their 2008 Browser Statistics, I'm in the minority. Internet Explorer is still the most widely used browser, but Firefox is quickly meeting them halfway. W3school reports that as of July 2008, Internet Explorer 6 and Internet Explorer 7 are running neck and neck, and 26.4% and 25.3% respectively. Some late adopters, only .3%, are still hanging on to IE5. Firefox has gained almost half the market - quickly gathering up 42.6% of internet users. Poor Opera, only 1.9% have realized how wonderful the Opera browser is. Opera is a lot faster than IE and Firefox and is highly customizable. Disclosure: I have nothing to gain by promoting any browser. I just really like Opera. Hey, out of 215 million internet users in the US alone reported by Plunkett Research, 1.9% isn't too bad.

A great website that I visit frequently for Internet stats is Internet World Stats. If you need Internet Statistics, you'll find demographics like local, global, regional Internet and population information and all kinds of graphs to go along with it. Internet Stats is in my permanent bookmarks. I think they may sell some data, but there are pages and pages of free data for you to use to give your reports or research some more awe-inspiring data. (THAT many people are on the Internet?!!? I didn't even know that many people were alive!)

I'm adding to this post on August 26, 2008 after reading some more browser statistics on Tech Republic. The browser share they quote from The Counter is significantly different than W3Schools. (The Counter charges $19.95 and W3Schools is free.) They list IE at 77% and Firefox at 17%. I don't know about you - but that sounds far too low for fast-growing Firefox. For this blog, Firefox is the browser of choice and holds the majority at 41% and IE at 28%. W3School is given high regard in developer circles - and if you need to quote some browser statistics - quote the statistics from W3School. The Tech Republic article has some interesting comments and it's a worthwhile read for developers.

Adding to the post September 18, 2008: Just found this link with a graph on browsers in Russia from the Russian Opera blogger Andrey Petrov. Here are some more Opera browser statistics from his blog. He has a new baby in the home..so the posts are a little outdated - but I thought they might be of interest to someone researching browser statistics.

Update November 2009: Google Chrome Captures 3.6% of market.

2009 trends in browser statistics according to W3schools. Woo hoo! Opera is up to 2.3%!

For interest, there's a January 2009 article which lists reasons why statistics from the past may be skewed (i.e, election time).

Then there's Opera mini which has a far larger global share in the mobile browser wars.

Statistics on browsers in Russia.

The Opera 10 announcement at Canada.com states:

Microsoft's Internet Explorer is used for about 60 percent of global Internet traffic, and Mozilla's Firefox has about 30 percent, with usage of Opera, Google and Apple all around 3 percent each, according to Web analytics firm StatCounter.

Opera has a small share of the global desktop browser market, but its browser is the most popular in countries like Russia or Ukraine, and its mobile browser is the most widely used browser on handsets.

Opera also has their "State of the Mobile Web" report with current global statistics on mobile browser usage, particularly Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

Nonetheless, a simple chart showing the growth of Opera mini clearly demonstrates it's growth, and Stat Counter has 2009 statistics demonstrating that Opera Mini is overtaking the Iphone for mobile browsing. A September 2009 article from FinChannel (global financial news), also reports Opera Mini as the most popular mobile browser. Their quote:

Now, more than 31.9 million people use Opera Mini to browse the Web from their mobile phones. In August, Opera Mini gained at least one new user every second.

An article from Tech Arena has the same quote, but it goes further to list Opera statistics from Europe and around the globe. Here's their take on the top countries using Opera Mini:

The top 10 countries for Opera Mini usage are (in order): Russia, Indonesia, India, China, Ukraine, South Africa, United States, Nigeria, United Kingdom and Poland. There is no change to the top 10 countries this month.

But, those top 10 have changed. WatBlog reports the current top ten as of September as:

Russia, Indonesia, India, China, Ukraine, South Africa, United States, United Kingdom, Poland and Vietnam

They also list the top sites visited in India, comparing Google, Yahoo and others, and has other stats on Opera mobile browsing from September 2009.

Since I have other posts related to Africa and I'm finding interest in statistics from Africa from my readers, here's a website dedicated to PC and phone mobility in Nigeria, with statistics on Opera Mini in Nigeria.

There is a very resourceful wiki at W3org that lists mobile browsing statistics in developing countires, and has links to statistics on mobile browsing in Africa, including a Africa 2008 Mobile Fact Book in pdf format, and a pdf file with 2009 stats on mobile phone usage in Africa. More statistics on Africa browsing and mobility, including the expensive costs and transmission data, can be found at Martin Sauter's blog post on Africa and the Mobile Internet.

Boy did this update take on an angle I didn't expect. I'll have to get these recent links into my search engine.

Have fun keeping up with the browser wars - and don't let the statistics on mobile browser wars go unnoticed.