If it is your birthday to day, Happy Birthday and I hope that you have a good one but you need to brace yourself because today there is a 13.6% greater chance that you will die than on any other day of the year. Don’t just take my word for it, it has been proven by Swiss scientists who studied more than 2.5 million deaths admittedly in their own country. You may have already read about this as the story was released in June but I only came across it as I was asked by my eldest daughter if I thought many people died on their birthday and being inquisitive I just had to find out.
No one really knows why this happens. There was an idea that somehow people were hanging on until the day or that having arrived at it they gave up life but there is no evidence for this, there is not a dip in the likelihood of death either side of a birthday. Another suggestion is that it is the revelry and celebration that does people in but again this may not be true as the rate increases significantly once over sixty and they are probably not painting the town quite as red as when they were in their prime.
Heart attacks and strokes account for many of the deaths but strangely there is also a 10% rise in the number of deaths by cancer on birthdays. What is most sad however is that suicides in men rise by a third over the usual rate on that day.
So what could be the cause? Could it be the excitement of opening your presents, the realisation that you really aren’t getting any younger or the stress of having your in-laws round and having to look enthusiastic? Who knows?
But the interesting thing about this story is how this information was locked away in the myriad of data that is now being collected about each and every one of us, shopping habits, web site preferences and health records. The list is almost endless and is growing exponentially. The numbers lie dormant but they have so many stories to tell and bit by bit we are finding ways to unlock these secrets and make use of the information in ways we never thought possible before.
There are enormously rich seams of information to mine and this will lead to the development of new tools and applications that will take human kind to new levels of consciousness. Mining this data and making use of what it tells us will be the creation of a new industrial revolution.
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 