16 Little Known Facts About Death

As a home schooling mom, I have a wide variety of experiences and learning. During our recent study about death, here is some of the interesting facts I shared with my children.

Little Known Fact About Death #1 ~
No American has officially died of 'old age' since 1951, when the government eliminated that classification on death certificates.

Little Known Fact About Death #2 ~
At least one place (in India) doesn't bury their dead. They leave the dead bodies sitting out to be consumed by vultures.

Little Known Fact About Death #3 ~
In the 19th century, Egypt had such an excess of mummies that they started using them as fuel for trains engines.

Little Known Fact About Death #4 ~
Approximately 100,000,000,000 people (that's 100 billion!) have died since humans began.

Little Known Fact About Death #5 ~
Eighty percent of people who die in the United States die inside of a hospital.

Little Known Fact About Death #6 ~
Queen Victoria insisted that she get buried with the bathrobe of her long-dead husband, Prince Albert. She also took a plaster cast of Albert's hand with her to the grave.

Little Known Fact About Death #7 ~
A Swedish company called 'Promessa' now offers an ecological burial. They freeze-dry your body in liquid nitrogen, then pulverize it with high-frequency vibrations, and then put your powdered remains into a cornstarch coffin. It all decomposes within six to twelve months.

Little Known Fact About Death #8 ~
American dead people are not very environmentally friendly. Burials in the USA put 827,060 gallons of embalming fluid (formaldehyde, methanol, and ethanol), into our soil each year. Meanwhile, cremation pumps dioxins, hydrochloric acid, sulfur dioxide, and carbon dioxide into the air.

Little Known Fact About Death #9 ~
Maybe people just aren't comfortable using the word 'die'. There are more than 200 euphemisms for death, so we don't have to utter the real words.

Little Known Fact About Death #10 ~
In Madagascar, dead people's families dig up the bones of the deceased bones parade them around the village during their 'famadihana' ceremony . The remains are then wrapped in a new shroud and buried again. Meanwhile, the old shroud is given to a newly married, childless couple. They use it to cover to cover the marriage bed.

Little Known Fact About Death #11 ~
More people die by suicide in New York City than are murdered there.

Little Known Fact About Death #12 ~
In 19th-century Europe so many living people were declared dead by mistake that they had to start laying out the alleged-to-be-dead people in special "hospitals for the dead" to await signs of putrefaction, just to be sure they were really dead.

Little Known Fact About Death #13 ~
In the end, 'lack of oxygen' is always the final cause of death.

Little Known Fact About Death #14 ~
The practice of burying the dead bodies dates back 350,000 years, fossils even older than Neanderthal Man have been found by archaeologists.

Little Known Fact About Death #15 ~
The same enzymes that digest your food while you're alive will start eating your body once you're dead.

Little Known Fact About Death #16 ~
While embryos are developing, some cells must die. This programmed cell death, keeps use from being born with webbed duck-like feet.

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