Despite inflation and rising prices, the travel industry is set to boom in 2023. This applies above all to long-distance travel, which in the past Corona years was either not possible at all or only possible with many restrictions such as quarantine on entry. Since the last restrictions have also been lifted in many countries in the past few months, demand is increasing significantly. But what about safety for vacationers in many countries?
Seven Evaluation Criteria of the Safety Index
The Travel Safety Index of the American insurance portal “The Swiftest“ has taken a close look at the 50 most visited travel countries worldwide and evaluated them based on the following seven risk factors:
- Homicide rate per 100,000 population
- Traffic fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants
- Death rate from poisoning (environmental toxins, etc.) per 100,000 inhabitants
- Death rate from poor hygiene conditions per 100,000 inhabitants
- Rate of life-shortening infectious diseases per 100,000 inhabitants
- Rate of life-limiting injuries per 100,000 population
- risk of natural disasters
Data for each risk factor comes from sources such as the World Health Organization, the World Bank, and the United Nations and World Risk Report.
The 20 most dangerous countries in the world
Even if the risk when traveling depends heavily on the type of holiday (those who book an all-inclusive resort usually have a lower risk than travelers who explore the country on their own), the following countries are among the most dangerous holiday destinations worldwide according to the index :
- South Africa
- India
- Dominican Republic
- Mexico
- Brazil
- Cambodia
- Philippines
- Saudi Arabia
- Vietnam
- Indonesia
- China
- Thailand
- Romania
- Iran
- Morocco
- Uzbekistan
- Kyrgyzstan
- Malaysia
- Argentina
- USA
South Africa, India and Dominican Republic – crime, hygiene and traffic fatalities
The reason why South Africa is the sad leader of the most dangerous countries is mainly due to its high homicide rate. According to The Swiftest, 68 people are killed there every day. The reasons for this are complex, but primarily due to factors such as poverty, unemployment, corruption, drug abuse and gang crime.
In India, on the other hand, the second most dangerous travel destination, the main problem is different: while the country has a relatively low homicide rate compared to South Africa, it takes first place when it comes to poor hygienic conditions. The majority of the Indian population lives in great poverty.
The Dominican Republic, the third most dangerous travel destination according to the “Travel Safety Index”, has an extremely high number of traffic deaths and is far ahead of all other 49 countries in the index.
The 20 safest countries in the world
According to the index, the following countries are among the safest travel destinations for vacationers:
- Singapore
- Denmark
- Netherlands
- Switzerland
- Israel
- Sweden
- Austria
- Ireland
- Italy
- Germany
- Great Britain
- Spain
- Portugal
- Greece
- Japan
- France
- Czech Republic
- Belgium
- Australia
- Croatia
Singapore, Denmark and Netherlands are the safest
According to the index, Singapore is considered the safest holiday destination in the world: Neither the number of traffic fatalities nor the risk of natural disasters are high there. The homicide rate is the lowest of any top ten country. According to “The Swiftest”, this is partly due to the strict judiciary and the high police presence in the country. Therefore, the crime rate is generally low. Because even small offenses are punished relatively severely there. Only when it comes to infectious diseases does the Southeast Asian country perform worse than the other countries in the top ten list.
Denmark’s homicide rate is also low at 1.0, but slightly higher than Singapore’s 0.2 and the Netherlands’ 0.6. According to The Swiftest, the fact that the crime rate is also so low is due to the country’s well-developed social system.
The same applies to the Netherlands. Only the road fatality rate, at 4.0, and the risk of natural disasters, at 4.0, are higher there than in Singapore (2.1 and 0.8) and Denmark (3.7 and 1.0).
Germany in 10th place
According to the index, the Federal Republic of Germany is in 10th place among the safest countries. While the homicide rate is 0.9, Germany performs worse than the other top nine countries on a number of counts:
- In the category of deaths from poor sanitary conditions, it scored 0.6 – all other top ten countries are 0.1 to 0.3.
- With a value of 3.9, the natural catastrophe risk factor is also higher than in most of the top ten countries. Only Italy (9.4), Israel (4.7) and the Netherlands (4.0) finish worse in this respect.