The myth of overpopulation

Letter February 10, 2019
Why population continues to remain a threat has more to do with inefficient use and rapid depletion of resources

TERUEL, SPAIN: We have recently seen a big campaign in the media for the world having to face the unfortunate consequences of overpopulation with the birth of the inhabitant seven billionth baby that was a girl from the Philippines — Danica Camacho, born on 30 October, 2011. This information was managed and propagated by the UN through its agency of the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA), but its reliability is not very secure, because there is neither a way of counting one by one the inhabitants on Earth nor controlling the deaths caused by wars, abortions or other deadly endemics. But the objective of the UN was to launch a propagandist campaign about the myth of overpopulation to justify that the increase in population is disastrous to sustainability of resources and our environment. The myth of overpopulation was forged by Malthus with theories that claimed that population growth threatens the welfare of humanity. But this myth is falling before the actual facts. In Europe and other developed countries, the decline in fertility is dramatic, the population pyramid is inverted and the birth rate is below the level of generational replacement.

Additionally, with more youth choosing to delay marriage for their career, variety of birth control methods and preference to have fewer babies, population demographics have changed massively. Why population continues to remain a threat has more to do with inefficient use and rapid depletion of resources.

The solution of developing reproductive health programmes to implement contraceptive, abortion and mass sterilisations laws have already been in place for long. It seems that in order to have fewer poor people on Earth, the proposed solution is to eliminate or kill thousands or millions of children before birth, facilitating millionaires business of abortion clinics, pharmaceutical laboratories and contraceptive pills.

The problem of hunger and the basic shortcomings to have a dignified life are the real cause of the world’s overpopulation.

But the West and its agencies prefer combating poverty by preventing the births of innocent human beings. The solution to the problem of population burden hence lies somewhere else and not in controlling a process that the nature has created.

Arturo Ramo

Published in The Express Tribune, February 10th, 2019.

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