How many of you found yourself coming down with “lottery fever” over the past week as our nation watched the Powerball roll over again and again. People that have never played the lottery in their life were coming out in herds to purchase tickets. It was a phenomenon to which this country had never experienced before: one very lucky shot at becoming a billionaire overnight. Every single one of us that stopped by a convenient store to pick up that “winning ticket” knows the odds of winning are not favorable, yet we find the time and the money to play anyway. What most of us do not have, however, is a relative perspective for just how unlikely a winning ticket actually is.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal published a column last year on “20 things more likely to happen to you than winning the lottery.” A few of these included being crushed by a meteorite (1 in 700,000), contracting Ebola in the U.S. (1 in 13.3 million) or dying in a plane crash (1 in 11 million), in addition to some quite humorous ones. http://www.reviewjournal.com/business/money/20-things-more-likely-happen-you-winning-lottery However, the article didn’t even bother citing other types of disasters such as being killed by an earthquake (1 in 150,000), flood (1 in 175,000) or by smoke, fire or flames (1 in 1200) due to the likelihood of these being much more likely. Keep in mind the odds above are “fatal” odds and your likelihood of experiencing one or more of these to a “less than fatal” degree are much greater. The point of this being, how many of you played or play the lotto that have not taken any active steps to prepare for one of the much more likely disasters cited above?
This article is not suggesting that you stop playing the lotto. Instead, it’s merely to highlight the importance of disaster preparedness through a statistical lens. If you truly want the best for yourself, your family and anybody else in your life then bet on the odds of a disaster-prepared household. For more information on how you can get your 2016 off to a prepared start please visit the following sites:
UCI Emergency Management: http://www.police.uci.edu/em/index.html
Ready OC: http://www.readyoc.org/
Ready.Gov: http://www.ready.gov/
We encourage the community to partner with the UC Irvine Police Department to prevent or report crime by calling (949) 824-5223. If you wish to remain Anonymous, call “OC Crime Stoppers” by dialing 855-TIP-OCCS (855-847-6227), text "OCCS" plus your tip to CRIMES (274637), or use the website http://occrimestoppers.org/
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