According to the World Health Organization, road crashes killed about 1.19 million people in 2021, more than two every minute. They are the leading cause of death worldwide for children and young people aged 5 to 29. More than half of the victims are pedestrians, cyclists or riders of motorised two-wheelers. About 92% of deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries, which have only around 60% of the world's vehicles.
That's the estimate from a WHO-led study published in The Lancet in 2024, covering the half-century since the Expanded Programme on Immunization was launched in 1974. It works out to about six lives saved every minute, mostly infants. The measles vaccine alone accounts for around 60% of those lives.
According to the World Gold Council, about 216,000 tonnes of gold have been mined in all of human history. Because gold is so dense (19.3 tonnes per cubic metre), it would fit in a cube about 22 metres on each side, roughly the height of a seven-storey building. Strikingly, about two-thirds of it has been mined since 1950.