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From Joel Veitch

I am somewhat perturbed by this whole nanohazard malarkey (Feedback, 4 November). There does not appear to be an SI unit of hazard, and so the precise amount of hazard constituted by a nanohazard is as yet undefined. A quick look at the reports available from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents at informs us that in 2002, 4080 accidents were caused in the home by a curtain.

This would seem to present a good candidate for an SI unit – many people are exposed to a curtain on a regular basis, and 4080 accidents annually constitutes a significant level of hazard. I therefore propose the curtain as the SI unit of measurement for hazard.

Interestingly, a very quick scan through the statistics reveals that an air bed or lilo constitutes a hazard of almost exactly 1 centicurtain. The data set is large enough only to measure hazards down to 5 millicurtains – the hazardicity of an artist’s brush.

If we had a study of a billion people, and found precisely one instance of a particular home injury in one year, then we would have found a 1 nanocurtain hazard. We could then finally place a nanohazard warning sign upon the item, to alert the populace to its level of hazard.

I implore the government to commission such a study as a matter of urgency.

London, UK