The reinsurance company Swiss Re yesterday released its preliminary annual loss data for 2007.

Swiss Re Loss data

Notable elements are:

• Their initial estimate is that >20 000 people were killed by natural and man-made catastrophes in 2007

• Financial losses from catastrophes represented a loss of USD 61 billion across the globe

• The three largest financial losses occurred in Europe as a result of storms
  

• Four of the five biggest losses of life occurred in Asia.

• Insured losses amounted to USD 25 billion, which is USD 9 billion higher than in 2006.

My own dataset suggests that the number of people killed by landslides in 2007 to date is about 2,600 – i.e. more than 10% of the global disaster toll.

Finally, Swiss Re usefully publish a graph of insured catastrophe losses since 1970:

Note that there appears to be something wrong with the x-axis here, but the overall upward trend is clear. 2007 probably ranks as a below trend year in terms of insured losses.