Avocados may seem innocent, but these oblong fruits sent almost 9,000 people to US emergency rooms in 2018 alone.
Injuries sustained by hacking at the pit or slicing while holding the fruit have become so common, doctors have dubbed them avocado hand.
Of course, there is a safer way to cut avocados.
But knives are just one of the hazards kitchens harbor.
In the US, between 2011 and 2022, the deadliest kitchen appliances were ovens and ranges — appliances that are stoves and ovens in one.
They took lives by causing fires and leaking carbon monoxide, a gas that can cause suffocation at high concentrations.
These kinds of sudden, catastrophic fatalities are thankfully rare.
But the kitchen dangers that cause the most casualties may actually be less immediate and more gradual — involving constant exposures, like stuff in the air we breathe.
Ovens and stoves remain a major culprit here.
Indeed, the fourth leading cause of years of life lost globally is air pollution.
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