Vaccinated Americans more likely to die from a lightning strike than Covid

[neolog]

- 41 lightning deaths per year in the USA [1] out of 328M people. 41/328M = 1.25e-7

- 1,263 covid deaths in the USA out of 163M vaccinated [2]. 1263/163M = 7.75e-6 and it's not even August.

Seems wrong, by more than (vaccinated=1263/163M)/(lightning=41/328M) = 62x. Or am I missing something?

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/06/08/us-weather...

[2] https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/health-departments/bre...

[Fjolsvith]

No, you pegged the piece properly.

[shadowgovt]

Your second numerator should be COVID deaths of vaccinated people, not total COVID deaths.

[ohiovr]

Well there are more thunderstorms this year, in Ohio at least. Even brick walls are getting destroyed by them.

[ed]

In 2021 there were no lightning deaths in the US as of June [0]. This stat compares the lifetime odds of death from lightning [1] to several months of covid data.

0 - https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/06/08/us-weather...

1 - https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/all-injuries/preventable-death-o...

[mint2]

Yes the author of this article seems not to know statistics very well and is comparing apples to oranges, and why did wapo let it get published with such glaring wrong logic. Being an opinion piece doesn’t mean throw out all standards.

[eesmith]

3 deaths as of 7/20/2021 - https://www.weather.gov/safety/lightning-fatalities . The first was on June 9th, one day after your [0].

2021 has had an uncommonly low number of deaths. The same link says the 10 year average is 25 fatalities per year, and on average about 7 by the end of July.

[rsynnott]

Funnily enough, one of the reported SAEs for the original Moderna trial was a (non-fatal) lightning strike. Obviously, this was nothing to do with the vaccine, but Moderna did have to declare it.

[peakaboo]

Unlike me, who is unvaccinated. And in rather have a lighting strike hit me in the head than take that vaccine. 100%.

[Tagbert]

What facts do you use to justify that risk calculation to yourself? Or is it more of an “ick” factor?

[blacktriangle]

In other news, unvaccinated Americans more likely to die from a lightning strike than Covid.