#5: Safe?
The clinic waiting room was overflowing.
Mr. X was not happy. The itraconazole he got for his fungal infection gave him a rash, for which he had to go to the ER.
I apologized.
“You must have walked to the clinic,” I then asked.
“Well! I live 40 miles away, and just like anyone else, I drove.”
“But driving is not that harmless, I think.”
In 2023, 23,959 passenger-vehicle occupants died in traffic crashes in the U.S., and an estimated 1.9 million were injured.¹
And yet, we get into our cars every day.
Medications have risks too. More than 1.5 million emergency-department visits each year are attributed to adverse drug events, with almost 500,000 requiring hospitalization.²
Separately, U.S. death certificates recorded 555 deaths in 2020 specifically from adverse effects of drugs used therapeutically.³
I wonder…
Are we seeing sharks or bristlemouths?
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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reports 23,959 passenger-vehicle occupant deaths and an estimated 1,947,298 injuries in 2023. Crash Stats
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CDC reports more than 1.5 million U.S. emergency-department visits for adverse drug events each year, with almost 500,000 requiring hospitalization. CDC
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Using CDC WONDER death-certificate data and ICD-10 codes for adverse effects of drugs in therapeutic use, the study recorded 555 ADR-related deaths in 2020 and 8,425 over 1999–2020. The authors specifically caution that the findings rely on death-certificate data.