Some of these deaths have been relatively high profile. In Canada—while we don’t know if it was for a selfie—three social media influencers were killed this year after falling into a river and being swept over a waterfall. In May of this year, a man in India was mauled to death by a bear while trying to get a selfie. There have been several stories of people falling just after they’ve taken the selfie leaving only the ghostly photo of them seconds before their demise. The study makes it clear that this isn’t a small problem and there are almost certainly more people out there who died taking selfies than the 259 they reported.
“This is just the tip of the iceberg,” reads part of the study. “Many cases are not reported.”
In regards to those 259, the researchers broke down the geography of the deaths and found that the “highest number of incidents and selfie-deaths” were in “India followed by Russia, the United States, and Pakistan.” The average age of those getting killed was unsurprisingly pretty young at 22.94 years. According to the data, the chance of you reaching death by selfie drops off significantly (again, unsurprisingly) by the time someone hits 30. Just over three-quarters of those killed taking selfies were men (also, unsurprisingly).
