Statistics - Essay Example

Fire Alarms Save Human Lives A fire alarm, also referred to as smoke alarm, is a device that detects and alerts people through audio or visual means should there be fire or smoke. With fires affecting many US homes every year, these devices are critical in every residence. Statistics from a telephone survey by the US National Fire Protection Association, NFPA show that Americans have indeed appreciated the importance of that this device plays in ensuring their safety as 24 out of 25 of the surveyed homes have at least one fire alarm (Ahrens, 2014).

This representing about 96% of all homes is a remarkable improvement from 1977 when only 22% of the homes had fire alarms. In fact, in all the home fires that were reported during the period of the survey, smoke alarms were installed in the respective homes.Nonetheless, there still remains much more to be done in order to meet the objective of making people safe in their homes. Considering the 4% of the households that do not have fire alarms, Ahrens (2014) places the count at about 5 million.

This was the cause of 37% home fire deaths. Even aggravating the issue further is the finding that of all the reported fires during the period of NFPA study, only 52% of the fire alarms operated. The malfunctioning of these fire alarms was the cause of the 23% of home fire deaths. Therefore, fire alarms play a crucial role of saving human lives from home fires. However, statistics show that much more need to be undertaken to have more homes install these devices and have them function as required.

ReferenceAhrens, M. (2014, March). Smoke alarms in U.S. home fires. National Fire Protection Association. Retrieved 1 July 2014 from http://www.nfpa.org/~/media/files/research/nfpa%20reports/fire%20protection%20systems/ossmokealarms.ashx