The Surprising Risks of Playing It Safe
Even Being Careful Has Unintended Consequences

..."When people don't cycle, they're not getting exercise," he said. "We know that not getting exercise and being sedentary is incredibly dangerous. You get heart attacks, you get strokes … proven killers that kill thousands of people...

Unintended consequences of well-intended safety rules are not unusual. In 1972, the FDA passed a law requiring child safety caps on many medications... Because these safety caps are often so hard to get off, some people — particularly older people — just leave them off altogether, and some parents, feeling protected by the cap, leave the aspirin where kids can reach it.

A study on the "lulling effect" concluded that an additional 3,500 children have been poisoned by aspirin because of the regulation.

A second example: You may have seen the warnings about anti-depressants. The FDA demanded that a black box be added to every package. The unintended consequence? Prescriptions to anti-depressants dropped 20 percent. And with fewer teenagers taking the medication, many experts say they are seeing more teen suicide...

And here's an odd one. Most of us, when we have a new baby in the house, make an extra effort to keep the house especially clean. I was no exception. But now there's research suggesting that kids who are exposed to more endotoxins — mild dust, bacteria, pollen, like kids who go to daycare or have pets or live on farms — are less likely to develop allergies and asthma.