Accidents

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According to ROSPA (Royal Society for the Prevention of Acronyms), most accidents (including fatalities) happen in the home, and since they normally spend more time in this environment than anyone else, pensioners are advised to live in a field or share a rocky ledge with a guillemot as soon as they retire.

If this is not practical, the safest alternative is to avoid the lounge and kitchen (where almost 54% of all accidents occur) and spend the majority of your time in a wardrobe (4%), airing cupboard (3%) or colander (0.6%).  It is also prudent to avoid vegetables, which in 2013, were involved in more than 14,000 accidents requiring hospital treatment, as well as curtain pelmets (123 accidents), watering cans (739) and cardigans (1046).

Where transport is concerned, pensioners are least likely to be involved in an accident while hang-gliding, riding an ostrich or skippering a dredger (except on the River Ouse), while sports-related accidents account for almost 9% of the total and include injuries caused by javelins, cribbage boards and ludo counters.

Almost 83% of pet owners have been involved in an accident with their pet, with the most common being tripping over a dog lead, mistaking a tortoise for a stepping stone and unintentionally ingesting a macaw.

Perhaps reassuringly, ROSPA has shown there is no substance in the concept of being accident-prone, though inherently clumsy people are generally advised not to attempt the Fosbury flop over barbed wire fences or use a skipping rope on precipitous cliff-top footpaths.

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