The majority of 25 to 34-year-olds have sex three to four times a week,” I read. There I am, minding my own business on the train and a statistic attacks. Four times a week? I do some quick desperate calculations in my head. That can’t be right, can it? “For 35 to 44-year-olds, it’s more likely to be twice a week,” the article continues. Well, I’m 33. Which is nearly 35. But still . . . twice a week? Don’t any of these people have kids? Or jobs?

At work I search for a more encouraging statistic. The Durex website comes to the rescue. We, the British, have sex 55 times a year, it says. Even a GCSE mathematician will tell you that’s a snip over once a week. This must mean that if the 25-44 age group are averaging thrice-weekly how’s-your-father, everyone else must be almost hanky-panky free. But wasn’t there a report out recently that said the over55s were at it like rabbits? Someone, I conclude, must be lying – and my money’s on the 25 to 34-year-olds.

As of April Fool’s Day, all government statistics require a kitemark to show they’ve been approved by the new UK Statistics Authority. Anything that stops politicians making things up is a good thing, but it still won’t rid society of all the nongovernmental statistics that hang around making all our lives a misery.

It’s not just sex. Men who eat four meals a day are half as likely to be obese as men who eat three meals a day (Men’s Health); women who give birth in their forties are four times more likely to live to 100 (Grazia); eating sausages daily increases your risk of cancer by 20% (Daily Alarmist, sorry Mail); and my own favourite, women spend as much on make-up as they do on household cleaning products. Honestly, ladies.

At lunch, apropos of nothing, a female colleague storms over and says she was right: she is a better driver than me. “What’s your evidence?” I demand huffily. She tells me about a new survey which shows that men are three times more likely to be convicted of a driving offence than women. “Big wow,” I reply, “but statistically speaking I have hit 100% fewer lampposts than you. Which means I am 100% better.” You see how we need all our statistics kite-marked?

Back home at last, I bolt the door (you’re six times more likely to be burgled if you don’t) and think I’m safe from stats until my wife switches on the radio: 68% of women don’t have a pension, it accuses. She doesn’t have a pension. She panics. “Just thank God,” I say cheerily, “that you’re not a horse chestnut” – 49% of them have got deadly bleeding canker disease.

Sex is off which is bad, given the statistics. My mood thickens further when I remember that only one in nine readers gets to the end of the average article. This is below average so what’s the point in fin child-abduction panic button installed at the end of every street so we’re all just that bit more paranoid and overprotective of our kids.

I can’t see what the news is here . . . surely leaving your offspring to cry is de rigueur these days? Doesn’t everyone follow childless child guru Gina Ford and her controlled crying strategy? If your child has the temerity to cry, don’t go to it. Lord, no. Then you’ll be spoiling it. Just turn the baby monitor down, ignore the flashing red lights and crack on with your meal. Things will soon quieten down.

Don’t accuse them of being bad parents. Just normal ones. Perhaps that’s bad enough. This week’s shock Madeleine revelation: Gerry and Kate McCann left her and her younger siblings to cry themselves to sleep the night before she vanished. “Mummy, why didn’t you come when we were crying last night?” reads the the police statement leaked to a Portuguese journalist. Cue national sharp intake of breath. Cue McCanns straight back up the public enemy hit parade. Cue evil parents. Cue shocking way to behave.

And then the counterclaims from the McCann camp that at least it shows they were being honest. That it’s all a big plot to undermine their Euro-crusade. You know, the one where we’ll end up having a big red No point in falling out, JK

Wow, Harry Potter’s mum was looking hot last week, don’t you think? There, I said it. Well done, JK Rowling’s PR department. It worked. One simple wardrobe malfunction, one or two overfull cups, and all we poor, red-blooded saps are having our Rowling water-cooler moment.

“Did you see the photos?” “Yep, she looks good for 42.” “Don’t remember her being such a babe.” “I know, maybe it’s the hair.” At least it was the British Book Awards, not the Superbowl, and so the “malfunction” was fittingly, or unfittingly, tasteful. No full-studded nipple, à la Janet Jackson. Just a bit of spillage from a fetching £1,000 Gucci dress, followed by an overzealous cover-up by her press man. A bit like the last time it happened . . . yes, Ms Rowling has form on being somewhat décolleté.

What isn’t clear, this time, is why. It’s not as if the £545m author needs the publicity. Or the cash. Ah, but hang on. Might it be to do with her new competition? Katie Price, the artist formerly known as Jordan, was at the same do, nominated for a children’s book award, no less. But relax, Joanne, she didn’t win. She probably didn’t even write it. So put the heavenly cleavage away.

Immigrant sentenced – to NHS treatment

Middle England is up in arms – again. A Palestinian asylum seeker has won a court case to get treatment for his chronic liver disease on (wait for it) the National Health Service. For nothing. I know. Real hell in a handcart stuff, isn’t it? We didn’t pay our taxes to save the lives of dodgy immigrants, for goodness sake. You really know how bad things have become when High Court judges start showing compassion to dastardly immigrants.

Still, not all these foreigners would go anywhere near our glorious health service if they had a choice. When the son of Andrei Voronin, a £30,000-a-week Liverpool football player, developed a skin allergy, Voronin tried the NHS. “When we finally got to see a doctor, he said he didn’t know how to treat children and to try rubbing in this ointment. I was stunned.”

So Voronin flew his son back to Ukraine for proper medical attention, lots of tests and no MRSA. Yes, Ukraine. Can’t be that much better than Palestine, can it? It’s obviously preferable to the UK.

Two new sports vying for Olympic status this week. In lane one we have the 100-yard dash to snuff out a torch: it’s like egg-and-spoon, only you use a fire extinguisher instead, and have to dodge blue smurfs with black belts in tai chi. In lane two it’s the Who Can Invent the Best Excuse for Not Going to the Opening Ceremony relay. Hot contenders: Gordon Brown (“I’m going to the closing ceremony – isn’t that enough twirly dancers for one year?”); Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary-general (“Sorry, chaps, scheduling clash. I’m washing my hair”) and Angela Merkel, the German chancellor (“A Chinaman ate my dog and my dog ate my plane ticket”).

Rod Liddle is away