After heart disease and cancer the third leading cause of death among American men in 2002 was accidents, or unintentional injuries, according to the Mayo Clinic. Deaths from unintentional injuries, a large portion of which are workplace accidents, were more common than deaths from such common maladies as stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and diabetes.

In 2002, accidents killed 69,257 men. Motor vehicle crashes were the leading cause. More than twice as many men (31,064) as women (14,316) died in traffic accidents. Male drivers involved in such accidents were almost twice as likely as female drivers to be intoxicated.

Poisoning was the second-leading cause of fatal injury to men, followed by falls and drowning.

Workplace accidents — which include some vehicle crashes, poisonings, falls and drownings — are a significant cause of fatal injury to men, says Mayo Clinic, partly because men are concentrated in dangerous occupations such as agriculture, mining and construction. Although men hold 53.7 percent of all American jobs, they account for 92 percent of workplace fatalities. In 2002, workplace injuries killed 5,081 men and 443 women.