A post by "Kelly McLaughlin" | http://www.cancuncanuck.com/ Kelly is the author of "A Canuck in Cancun," a blog cataloging the ups and downs of life in Mexico, a bi-cultural relationship and a bilingual crazy kid, a beach and beach picture addiction and some random ex-pat thoughts. To see more posts by this author, click here.

With the apparent hysteria in the media about the dangers of Mexico and the anxious emails I’m receiving about upcoming trips, I thought I would touch on this subject one more time (see previous post here). In Cancun and Quintana Roo, at this moment in time, all is peaceful, all is calm and tourists are safe. According to today’s local paper “El Periodico”, the US State Department released a letter stating that their warning was intended to urge people to exercise caution in the border areas of the country, not to prohibit travel or imply that resort areas are unsafe. There have been no tourists killed in Cancun as a result of the war on drugs. Do people die here? Why, yes they do, car accidents, heart attacks, drownings, suicides, of course people die here, but random murders just don’t happen. The entire city of Cancun had only 65 murders last year, none of the victims were tourists. For a city of about 700 000 residents with millions of tourists visiting each year, that is not a scary statistic. Does crime against tourists happen? Yes, this is not Disneyland (and I am sure there are pick pockets there too), robberies occur, credit card fraud, rape (usually of the “date rape” variety, not random assaults on the street), all things that happen in any major city. Use your common sense and don’t put yourself or your things in dangerous situations.

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