What are the World’s Deadliest Animals, Really?
Beyond wild guesses and unfounded fears, a Top 10 list to put reality in perspective. Here be sharks, hippos, snakes and several surprises.
Pop culture and scary headlines can cause us to unjustifiably fear death by any number of threats, however minuscule the actual risk. Unless you live in certain disease-riddled locations or spend a lot of time off the beaten track among packs of predators, your odds of dying from all of the Top 10 killer animals combined is far less than the threat of expiring from either cancer or a heart attack.
Meanwhile, lists of the deadliest animals often regurgitate outdated and spurious statistics and frequently exclude animals that represent the biggest threats to human life.
So I’ve researched and analyzed multiple sources, and with several caveats noted at the bottom of this story, here’s what I believe to be the 10 deadliest animals in the wild, along with a few honorable mentions that deserve a cameo in your worst nightmares.
No. 10. Lions: 225 human deaths per year
Lions don’t generally want to mess with us, but they are territorial, and if hungry, they’ll hunt a human, so … don’t mess with lions. Their deadly…
