Generali's ANZAC Day Quiz

Generali

ging84 wrote: »

1 i'd go with a, to be honest i am surprised it's even that high, but that's the lowest option

2, i'll go with b, as although an awful lot of people's living standards will have gone up over that time, the population has also boomed, so i suspect it balances out.

3 i'll go with A, we've added over a billion people in 20 years, probably 2, only a small % of that can be that old people have forgotten it's their time to die, and it's about total not proportion, so it's got to have gone up, and this is the only option with an increase

Interesting answers ging84. I'll post the actual answers in a day or so.

Why do you think so few get vaccinated? Lack of access to medicine due to poverty/rural living without good transport or linked health scares?

vivatifosi

Morning Gen. As usual I'm aware that I probably won't get any right, but we'll see.

1 - measles. If I had to go for a number off the top of my head it would be 30% not vaccinated. So I'd need to pick half or 20% not vaccinated. I'm going to plump for 20% not. I was in the US last year when they had a measles outbreak and think I remember them saying something about vaccination rates worldwide being pretty good, but going backwards in places controlled by groups such as the Taliban. Whether quite good is 50% or 80% though, I really don't know. So 20% not.

Population in absolute poverty. I'm going to go for half as I seem to remember it being covered in the Millennium Development goals. Could be completely wrong there though.

Children in the world... I'm going to go for double. Partly because fewer are dying in their first five years, second because the world's most populous country is reducing its one child dependency.

In reality I haven't got a clue about any of them and my results will probably reflect that.

Generali

Thank you all, very interesting answers.

Most people got at least one answer right.

antrobus

chewmylegoff wrote: »

I expected better from you - normally I can rely on you to google it so I don't have to. Educated guesses are just not in your nature!

I decided to play the game this time round. People only moan otherwise that I've spoiled the fun.:)

Generali wrote: »

I chose the questions becuase they are tough to Google. I'll explain why later as they are very simple facts on the face of it.

Let me test that theory for you.:)

1. Nope. There's some easily found World Bank data on measles immunisation that leads me to believe that my initial guess was correct.

2. Nope. The answer is even on Wikipedia. Note that it matters. I knew the answer to that one anyway.

3. Trickier. There doesn't appear to be any clear answer.

But I do know that the rate of growth in the world population is slowing down, fertility is falling, that global life expectancy is increasing, and so I'm sticking by my original guess.

Edit: Actually I think I've found the original source for the questions posed. So I think I've found out what the answers are supposed to be.:)

paddyrg

Just because I'm uptight about these things, are all the figures based on reasonable assumptions/calculations from reasonable sources? I'm so, so suspicious of statistics as they can prove just about any point once they're aggregated, rounded, assumptions included and excluded, choices made about calculations (eg mean vs median vs modal), etc.

For instance, the anti-MMR lobby point out the explosion in autism around the time MMR was introduced as if it was the only factor, when in reality at the same time the definition of autism was changed to include a lot more kids, hence the rise.

Sorry if this doesn't feel like part of the spirit of the game, and I know you're smart and will understand, just it would affect my estimates knowing who and how the numbers were measured!!

Generali

paddyrg wrote: »

Sorry if this doesn't feel like part of the spirit of the game, and I know you're smart and will understand, just it would affect my estimates knowing who and how the numbers were measured!!

The numbers come from a Swedish professor of public health.

I have deliberately left big gaps between the answers so there's no ambiguity. Are 81% or 83% of kids vaccinated against measles is a rubbish question (IMHO) but are 20% or 80% of kids vaccinated is a great one.

Questioning the numbers is absolutely in the spirit of the game. Questioning the answers when I post them is too.

paddyrg

Cheers! In that case...

My hunches, for what they're worth-
1) 80%ish - measles vaccination is extremely cheap and effective, and vaccination for similar diseases like polio is almost globally complete now (only local showboating and politics is preventing a complete eradication)

2) I'd say about double people in 'absolute poverty', depending on how fixed those goalposts are. World population has expanded massively, so even if as a percentage it has reduced, lower-income populations tend to have more kids...

3) 20 years, I don't think the Chinese one-child policy will have as much effect as other factors, and anyway it was creatively worked-around frequently with 'twins' several years apart, etc. Fewer kids in the (low-population) West, expanding populations in Nigeria, India, etc. Going to have to go with 'double' as in conjunction with vaccination, the mortality rate will be reduced so more children surviving.

I suspect these questions are all related by the fact that if your kids have a high mortality rate, you have more of them, so immunisation providing lower infant mortality means eventually the birth rate will drop, so money not spread as thinly, so ultimately poverty gets reduced in absolute (not relative) terms.

antrobus

Generali wrote: »

The numbers come from a Swedish professor of public health...

Would that be the sword-swallowing Swedish professor of public health and celebrity statistician?:)

cepheus

I thought it was questions about the Gallipoli war, not that Swedish Profs, Hans whatisname stuff.

For a real question about Gallipoli. When the BBC suggested we honour the war dead who fought there, naming various political sectors of the world, which major nation and contributor who also suffered badly did they completely forget?

antrobus

cepheus wrote: »

I thought it was questions about the Gallipoli war, not that Swedish Profs, Hans whatisname stuff.

For a real question about Gallipoli. When the BBC suggested we honour the war dead who fought there, naming various political sectors of the world, which major nation and contributor who also suffered badly did they completely forget?

And there was Generali sounding all contented that "Most people got at least one answer right" and you have to go and spoil it all and get a big fat zero.:)