ROR Labs - Page 10 of 15 - Everyday risk, examined with evidence

Political and Geopolitical Risk | Sanctions and Economic Coercion

Half a Million Dead Children Carried the Argument About Sanctions. Three Later Surveys Found the Rise Never Happened.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 13, 2026October 2, 2026

Key takeaways · 13 min read The half-million figure rests on one survey: the 1999 Iraq Child and Maternal Mortality Survey, about 38,000 households. It reported under-five deaths rising from 59 to 116 per 1,000 between 1990 and 1991, reaching 142 by 1998. Three later national surveys — 2004, 2006 and 2011, covering 75,000 households…

Read More Half a Million Dead Children Carried the Argument About Sanctions. Three Later Surveys Found the Rise Never Happened.
Information and Belief | Psychological and Social Manipulation

Fifty-Two Contested Claims Were Corrected in One Study. Not One of Them Backfired.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 13, 2026October 2, 2026

Key takeaways · 12 min read The backfire effect comes from a 2010 paper whose own second experiment failed to reproduce it at the group level. The largest test since — five experiments, more than 10,000 people, 52 corrected claims — found it zero times. Across the literature, 81% of reported backfires used a single-question…

Read More Fifty-Two Contested Claims Were Corrected in One Study. Not One of Them Backfired.
Infrastructure Risk | Water and Sanitation

Four Weeks of Deliberate Stagnation Grew No Legionella. The Precautionary Flush Afterwards Raised It for a Fortnight.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 13, 2026October 2, 2026

Stagnation and Legionella are genuinely linked — in dead legs and capped pipe spurs. An empty building is a different claim, and in the one building anyone measured, the standard remedy backfired.

Read More Four Weeks of Deliberate Stagnation Grew No Legionella. The Precautionary Flush Afterwards Raised It for a Fortnight.
Family and Care | Social Risk

Family Carers Are Widely Said to Face a 63 Per Cent Higher Risk of Death. In 1.1 Million Linked Records, They Died Less Often Than Everybody Else.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 13, 2026October 2, 2026

The famous figure came from 392 people, applied only to strained spouses, with a confidence interval starting at 1.00. Larger studies found the reverse — and inside them, strain still predicts death.

Read More Family Carers Are Widely Said to Face a 63 Per Cent Higher Risk of Death. In 1.1 Million Linked Records, They Died Less Often Than Everybody Else.
Civil Unrest and Policing | Political and Geopolitical Risk

Eighty-Four Per Cent of Eye Injuries From Rubber Bullets Ended in Permanent Blindness. No One Can Tell You the Odds of Being Hit.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 13, 2026October 2, 2026

A systematic review of 26 studies found 1,984 people struck by kinetic impact projectiles: 53 died and 300 were permanently disabled. Neither that review nor its companion on tear gas can give you a rate, and both say so.

Read More Eighty-Four Per Cent of Eye Injuries From Rubber Bullets Ended in Permanent Blindness. No One Can Tell You the Odds of Being Hit.
Psychological and Social Manipulation | Relationship Manipulation

The Word Arrived a Decade Before the Evidence. A Review of Gaslighting in Intimate Relationships Found Fourteen Eligible Studies.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 10, 2026October 2, 2026

File photo: a woman sitting by a large window. Photo: Alexandre Chambon (Unsplash), via Wikimedia Commons, CC0. In the news · April 2026 A Scientific Reports study from Turkey surveyed 333 women aged 20 to 40 in romantic relationships. Using standardized scales and mediation analysis, it found that higher self-silencing was linked to greater exposure…

Read More The Word Arrived a Decade Before the Evidence. A Review of Gaslighting in Intimate Relationships Found Fourteen Eligible Studies.
Health Risk | Medical Care

Medical Error Is Probably Not the Third Leading Cause of Death. In a Thousand Reviewed Hospital Deaths, 5.2 Per Cent Were Preventable.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 10, 2026October 2, 2026

File photo: a modern hospital room. Photo: JesusisGreat7, via Wikimedia Commons, CC0. In the news · September 2026 For World Patient Safety Day on 17 September 2026, the WHO focused on safe care for people with noncommunicable diseases. It states that about 1 in 10 patients are harmed during healthcare worldwide, roughly half of that…

Read More Medical Error Is Probably Not the Third Leading Cause of Death. In a Thousand Reviewed Hospital Deaths, 5.2 Per Cent Were Preventable.
Accident and Physical Hazard | Public Transport

Sixty-Four Per Cent of Seriously Injured British Bus Passengers Were Never in a Crash. And the Bus Is Still About Four Times Safer Than the Car.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 10, 2026October 2, 2026

In This Series: Road, Transit & Child Safety Nobody Skips the Car Seat. The Deaths Are in the Exceptions. Half of the People Who Die in Crashes Were Not Wearing a Belt Three Quarters of Pedestrian Deaths Happen After Dark. Your Reflective Vest Is in the Wrong Place. A Child Physically Cannot See a Car…

Read More Sixty-Four Per Cent of Seriously Injured British Bus Passengers Were Never in a Crash. And the Bus Is Still About Four Times Safer Than the Car.
Social Risk | Work and Livelihood

Job Loss Raised Men’s Death Rate by 44 Per Cent for Four Years, Then the Effect Vanished. Alcohol and Suicide Did Most of It.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 10, 2026October 2, 2026

File photo: an English Jobcentre Plus office. Photo: Hassocks5489, via Wikimedia Commons, CC0. In the news · April 2026 The 2026 Economic Report of the President says workers displaced in mass layoffs face 50-100 percent higher mortality in later years, cutting life expectancy by roughly 1 to 1.5 years. It values that loss at about…

Read More Job Loss Raised Men’s Death Rate by 44 Per Cent for Four Years, Then the Effect Vanished. Alcohol and Suicide Did Most of It.
Infrastructure Risk | Water and Sanitation

Eighty-Seven Per Cent of Boil-Water Advisories in One State Followed a Broken Pipe, Not a Positive Test. Nobody Has Shown the Advisories Themselves Reduce Illness.
BySeung Hyoun Kim September 10, 2026October 2, 2026

Key takeaways · 11 min read In Kentucky over seventeen years, 87% of 36,673 boil-water advisories were issued because of a line break or leak, not because of a positive test. Average duration was five days. A pressure loss stops the pipe being a sealed system. That is the mechanism, and it has the best…

Read More Eighty-Seven Per Cent of Boil-Water Advisories in One State Followed a Broken Pipe, Not a Positive Test. Nobody Has Shown the Advisories Themselves Reduce Illness.