Our country, Malaysia is definitely a wonderful travel location. However, a US insurance company named The Swiftest has recently listed our nation as the 18th most deadly country to travel to.
If you’re wondering how they came to that conclusion, well, we have you covered.
The mechanics
Basically, what they did was to take into account 7 safety risk factors for 50 of the most-visited countries to create their “Travel Safety Index”.
Those risks are:
- Homicide Rate (0-100 points) – The number of intentional homicides per 100,000 people.
- Road Traffic Death Rate (0-100 points) – The estimated road traffic death rate per 100,000 people.
- Poisoning Death Rate (0-100 points) – The mortality rate attributed to unintentional poisonings per 100,000 people.
- Unsanitary Conditions Mortality Rate (0-100 points) – The mortality rate that is attributed to unsafe sanitation, unsafe water, and a lack of proper hygiene per 100,000 people.
- Life Years Lost Due to Communicable Diseases (0-100 points) – The number of life years lost due to infectious diseases (adjusted for disabilities) per 100,000 people.
For illustration purposes only
- Life Years Lost Due to Injury (0-100 points) – Age-standardized and disability-adjusted life years lost due to injuries (including conflict, violence, and self-harm) per 100,000 people.
- Natural Disaster Risk (0-50 points) – Scores countries based on the risk of a natural disaster such as earthquakes, floods, or cyclones as well as the ability of the country to handle a disaster should it occur.
They then sourced demographic data from sites such as the World Health Organisation, United Nations Office, World Bank, Our World in Data, etc. and graded the countries accordingly.
South Africa, India and the Dominican Republic took the top 3 most deadly places to travel to while Malaysia was in 18th place.
In Malaysia’s case, we got an “F” in road traffic accidents and the life years lost due to communicable diseases department. As for the department that we “excelled” in, it was the unsanitary conditions mortality rate where we managed to get a “B+”.
Taking into account the rest of the factors, Malaysia scored a D+ on this list.
On the contrary, our southern neighbour, Singapore was listed as the safest country to travel to with a grade of “A+”. The insurance company says: “What makes Singapore so safe? Well, crime does not pay in Singapore. The consequences for committing crimes in Singapore are incredibly high, even for “smaller” crimes.”
“Combined with high surveillance and police presence, this makes Singapore the world’s safest country for travel.”
In second place is Denmark followed by the Netherlands.
This is certainly eye-opening but do you think that Malaysia is the 18th most deadly country to travel to? We don’t really think so, but let us know your thoughts on this in the comments.
Also read: M’sia Has One Of The Highest Number Of Indians In SEA & M’sians Believe They Should Be Thankful
