You’re reading Significant Digits, a daily digest of the numbers tucked inside the news.
6.1 seconds
Wasting time when leading in a match is an indelible soccer tradition, to the chagrin of opposing fans and the nervous delight of supporters. And no team did it better in this World Cup’s group stage than Peru. The Peruvians took over 6 seconds more than the average to complete their “routine soccer actions” while leading, including 7.9 seconds for free kicks, 8.6 seconds for goal kicks and 15 seconds for substitutions. Of the teams remaining, Sweden and France are best at this dubious task. [FiveThirtyEight]
20 women
In the annals of Wimbledon, married women are known as “Mrs.” and unmarried women as “Miss.” Their names are displayed with those titles on the tennis club’s board of champions, which includes 20 “Mrs.”s. “Ms.” has not made its way to the All England Club, and this distinction is also not applied to men. While Serena Williams is “Mrs. Williams” at Wimbledon, Roger Federer is simply “R. Federer.” [The New York Times]
33 people killed
A heat wave, the worst in decades, has sweltered the Canadian province of Quebec, killing 33 people as of Thursday. Temperatures hit 95 degrees Fahrenheit with high humidity, well above the 77 degrees that is typical in the region for this time of year. [BBC]
Nearly 3,000 children
There are still nearly 3,000 children in the care of the U.S. government who were separated from their parents after crossing the U.S. border. The Department of Health and Human Services is rushing against court-imposed deadline to reunite those children with their families. The usual methods of “verifying parents claims,” such as birth certificates, will take too long, according to the HHS secretary, so the agency will turn to cheek swabs and DNA tests. [NBC News]
26,000 species
The world now has more than 26,000 “threatened” species, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, a fact that is “adding to fears the planet is entering a sixth wave of extinctions.” Species which moved to a higher level of concern on the new so-called red list include the precious stream toad, two Japanese earthworms and the Bartle Frere cool-skink. [The Guardian]
$13,950,400 in ads
For the first time, supporters of the Affordable Care Act have spent more on ads than their opponents. Supporters have spent nearly $14 million on pro-Obamacare ads this cycle, about $500,000 more than was spent on anti-Obamacare ads. Despite the fact that Republican control the White House and Congress, their efforts to repeal the law have failed, and the law has become more popular in the meantime. [Huffington Post]
If you see a significant digit in the wild, please send it to @ollie.