Number of prescriptions for antidepressants for one year old children in financial years 2004/5, 2005/6, and 2006/7: 768, 355, 24
Number of prescriptions for antidepressants for under one year olds in financial years 2004/5, 2005/6 and 2006/7: 453, 41, 9
Projected rank of heart disease and severe depression among the leading causes of death and disability in 2020: 1, 2
Year in which Australian researchers found that the brain really does experience pain when your heart is breaking: 2003
Percentage by which British university graduates are less likely than non-graduates to phone their mothers regularly: 20
Percentage by which they are less likely to make regular visits: 50
Ranking of New Zealand compared with 30 other OECD countries for low user mobile phone charges, medium user and high user charges (respectively): 22, 25, 23.
Percentage of Kiwis who if given the possibility would download adult content to their mobile: 33.7
Amount spent worldwide on mobile-phone ring tones, expressed as a percentage of the global music market: 10
Price from an American company to turn the cremated ashes of a loved one into a 1.5-carat diamond: $36,000.00
Number of smaller diamonds the company offers in its “Family Plan” : 4
Increase in the cost of house prices nationwide compared with last year: $50,000
Average amount that U.S companies spend per search for a new CEO: $2,883,000
Chance that the CEO will quit or be fired within 18 months: 1 in 21
Date in which Fairfax Media CEO Joan Wither protested at the restrictions the International Rugby Board has imposed on media wanting to fully cover the Rugby World Cup: 7-9-2007
Ranking of New Zealand, Australia and England (respectively) if Massey University sport statistician Hugh Morton’s “adjustive ranking system” had been used in the last world cup: 1, 2, 3
Number of academic chairs worldwide devoted to the search for extraterrestrial intelligence: 1
Estimated number of asteroids whose orbits Earth crosses each year: 20,000,000
Ratio of U.S. spending on tracking asteroids in 2003 to spending on missile defense: 1:1,900
Months back that Australian Defence Minister John Moore criticised New Zealand’s decision to abandon a proposed upgrade of its maritime surveillance aircraft: 1
Number of countries besides Australia that have ever formally recognised Indonesia’s sovereignty over East Timor: 0
Year in which financier Francis McMahon was arrested in Australia on charges of bestiality with rabbits: 2005
Months later that the charges were dropped because prosecutors were unable to prove that his penis penetrated any rabbits: 1
Percentage chance that Brendan Francis McMahon came from Tamarama, New Zealand: 100
E-mail Pecking Orders to editor@salient.org.nz
SOURCES: 1,2. Written parliamentary question 15003 Judy Turner 3. Harvard School of Public Health (Boston, Mass.); 4. http://dsc.discovery.com/news/afp/20031006/ heart.html; 5, 6. Institute for Social and Economic Research, University of Essex (Colchester, U.K.); 7. The Dominion Post 17 April 2007; 8. www.stuff.co.nz; 9. ARC Group (London); 10, 11. LifeGem (Elk Grove Village, 111.); 12. The Dominion Post 10 September 2007; 13, 14. RHR International Company (Wood Dale, Ill.); 15. Fairfax Media 07-09 2007; 16. The Evening Standard 25 November 2003; 17. Professor William Welch, University of California (Berkeley, Calif.); 18. Jet Propulsion Laboratory (Pasadena, Calif.); 19. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Washington)/Missile Defense Agency (Washington); 20. One News Aug 23, 2000; 21. United Nations (N.Y.C.); 22, 23, 24. Sydney Morning Herald November 25, 2005.