I love your skepticism and that you went straight to relative vs absolute statistics.

Just pulling a random website from a search seems to support my memory that drowning is a much more common cause of death than people tend to realize and that alcohol is commonly involved. Then you need to think about the fact that the vast majority of people are no where near a situation where drowning is a risk most of the time, and you can start appreciating the risk of drowning when near or on water and drinking alcohol.