Global Monitor

“Youth Deficits — An Emerging Problem”

The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency reports a decline of young adults in developed countries and the emergence of a youth deficit, defined as less than 15 percent share of young adults within the total population.

By 1985, the proportion of young adults in Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, and Romania fell below 15 percent. The proportion of young adults in Yugoslavia will fall below 15 percent during the early to mid-1990s. While East Germany will experience the most severe youth deficit in the region, the combined German State will have a 10.5 percent population of young adults by the year 2000.

Sweden and Finland experienced deficits before 1985. Between 1985 and 1990, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Greece, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and West Germany were similarly affected. During the coming decade, France, Italy the Netherlands, Portugal, and Spain will develop deficits.

By 2010 the proportion of young adults in Greece, Italy and Spain will drop to levels slightly over 10 percent, placing them among the most severe cases by 2010.

The proportion of young adults in Japan by 2010 will fall to just over 10 percent and may be the lowest in the world. China will also have a youth deficit by the year 2000. Deficits will develop in Taiwan and South Korea by the year 2010. These three countries, which invested in population control programs, will experience the most extreme age structure changes of all.

The USSR and Canada developed youth deficits between 1985 and 1990. Australia will develop one in the middle 1990s. The proportion of young adults in Cuba will decline from 21.4 percent of the population in 1990 to 12.9 percent in 2000 and 14.7 in 2010.

In 29 developed and developing countries the labor pool will decrease by 35 to 40 million people — 9 to 12 percent — over the next two decades. The most severely affected countries in Western Europe and Japan will see 25 to 35 percent declines.1

Euthanasia

The Committee to Investigate the Medical Practice of Euthanasia set up on Feb.13, 1990, by the Dutch Minister of Justice and the Secretary of State for Health reported the following statistics:

— Prescribing, providing, or administering drugs with explicit intention of precipitating end of life: 3700 (2-9% of all deaths).

• Euthanasia on request: 2,300
• Assisting suicide: 400
• Life ending treatment without specific request: 1,000

— Intensifying pain and symptom suppression: 22,500 (17.5% of all deaths)

• Explicit purpose of accelerating end of life: 1,350
• Partial acceleration of end of life: 6,750
• Probability of acceleration of end of life: 14,400

— Withholding treatment (including tube-feeding) without request: 22,500 (17.5%)

• Explicit purpose of accelerating end of life: 3600
• Partial purpose of accelerating end of life: 4275
• Probability of accelerating end of life: 14,6252

IPPF — Midwives and Family Planning

IPPF views the midwife as the crucial link between the minimally trained health worker and the obstetrician. A WHO Task Force Meeting held in Geneva, 2-4 April, 1990 on Human Resource Development for Maternal Health and Safe Motherhood detailed the spheres of practice of a midwife to include essential “family planning” functions: “prescription of oral contraceptives; insertion of IUDs and subdermal implants of Norplant; and provision of social and psychological support, counseling and education of clients, families and communities, based on norms and values appropriate to society.”

The second ICM/WHO/UN- ICEF Pre-Congress Workshop in Kobe, Japan, in October 1990 went a significant step further. The resulting joint statement on “midwifery education-action for safe motherhood” emphasized an “intensified need for family planning skills and interaction with youth and women’s organizations.”3

Population Control Big Guns Misfire in U.S.

The United States spends more than $120 million supporting family planning in specific countries but it has cut assistance to UNFPA on the grounds that UNFPA gave tacit support to the Chinese government’s policy of forced abortion. Dr. Nafis Sadik, executive director of UNFPA, argues that the China issue was simply an “excuse” that the Reagan Administration used “to satisfy domestic [political] pressures.”

Dr. Halfdan Mahler, at the time of his retirement after 15 years as Director General of the World Health Organization to take up similar responsibilities with the International Planned Parenthood Federation, said in an interview that “ways must be found to reinvolve the United States in the dialogue” about world population problems and the role of family planning. “We need your moral and political leadership even more than we need your money.”4

But it hasn’t worked! In 1991, The U.S. House of Representatives failed to support the funding of the UNFPA death machine.

Contraceptive Experimentation on Men

The University of Paris Institute for Biology and Reproductive Medicine, headed by Dr. Jean Claude Soufir, has begun testosterone injection tests on male subjects. The French test is under the aegis of United Nation’s World Health Organization (WHO), which is conducting a broad study. In France, Great Britain, Sweden, Finland, the United States, Australia, Indonesia and China, 271 volunteers received the sex hormone. The effectiveness rate was judged to be 99 percent compared with 97 percent for the birth-control pill.

The male shot works similarly to the birth control pill. The weekly dose of 250 milligrams of testosterone overwhelms the pituitary, the control center that regulates the production of most hormones. It then stops stimulating the testicles to produce sperm.

Every man in the test must have his sperm examined four times a year to look for fertile sperm, and he must submit to blood tests that detect possible effects on his liver, kidneys, or bone marrow. France’s national health plan covers these costs.

Schering, a pharmaceutical firm based in Berlin, provided the testosterone doses for the WHO trials. Professor Friedmund Neumann, head of the hormone research at Schering, which is the world’s largest producer of female contraceptive pills and a leader in pharmaceutical research, believes that male resistance will make marketing difficult. “What male will let himself be injected every week?” he asked.5

Europe’s State·Financed Pension Programs Threatened

There are too many pensioner’s drawing on state funds and too few workers paying into the funds. By the year 2030, there will be one pensioner for every three workers Europe-wide. In Switzerland the ration will be 1 to 2. And every German worker will be contributing 24 percent of wages toward pension costs — up from 14 percent in 1990. At present, the government of Greece and Italy provide 80 percent of worker pensions. Astronomical costs are forcing European governments to renege on pension pledges made in the 1960s and ’70s, and the trend is likely to continue. In Britain, where the state provides 25 percent of pensions, companies and private insurers already are paying a substantial part of the remainder necessary to keep the retired workers afloat. Actuaries warn that to make up for the shortfall in pension funding by governments, tomorrow’s elderly should start closing the gap now through supplementary private insurance.6

U.S Audubon Society Turns to Pop-Control

The National Audubon Society has begun promoting population control as an “essential element” in preserving the world’s eco-system. In a recent publication Audubon chose Thailand and the U.S. state of Florida to illustrate how rampant population growth is jeopardizing the existence of birds and other wildlife through habitat destruction. The society, which originally focused on birds, was named for 19th century ornithologist John James Audubon. By gathering observations and experiences of sanctuary managers and wildlife experts from countries participating in the new program, Audubon hopes to contribute to the reversal of Earth’s exponential human population growth. And one major goal is — as one society official put it — to bring the issue home to Americans who tend to the think of the population problem as being over there in the Third World.

The damage inflicted by unchecked population growth cuts across international and regional frontiers, says Audubon Patricia Baldi. She urges Audubon to design their programs to stimulate thinking about the population issue. She says, “I’d like everyone to write a letter in support of better family p1anning.”7

Sri Lanka Payments for Sterilization

Sterilization was offered in population control programs in Sri Lanka as early as 1968. The compensatory payment scheme was initiated in the mid-1970s, mainly in the plantation sector. Since January 1980, a comprehensive national policy has stipulated that monetary payments be given to male or female acceptors of sterilization. The emphasis on sterilization was part of the present Sri Lankan Government’s population policy.

Sri Lanka’s national family planning program has changed from no payment to direct monetary payments for sterilization and the amount paid has changed several times since 1980. Cash payments to the surgical team were initiated in 1979 and have remained constant.

There have been substantial fluctuations, particularly in vasectomy acceptance, and these appear to be associated with changes in compensatory payments. The average number of vasectomy acceptors was just over 200 a month when no payment was given and increased to 1125 a month when the first payment of Rs 100 was introduced. It jumped dramatically to 14,000 acceptors per month when Rs 500 was given, then the volume declined to 1400 when the amount was reduced to Rs 200. However, in more recent years, the average number of acceptors has declined in spite of a return of the payment to the level of Rs 500.8

Inter-American Parliamentarians Use ‘Child Survival To Limit Births

“Contraceptive use can improve child survival, child survival can increase the demand for family planning.” Only after infant and child mortality is reduced, will parents recognize that they need not have “such large families.”

“In societies such as Costa Rica and Korea that have under- gone rapid fertility decline, some women who lose a child through death have been found to go on to have another child .… The policy implication of these results is that efforts aimed at lowering infant and child mortality alone will do little to lower aggregate births. In short, simultaneous efforts must be made to reduce fertility.”9

Family Health International

U.S. Agency for International Development has just donated $168 million to Family Health International (FHI, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina) to be used over a period of five years to fight AIDS. FHI works in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean developing programs against AIDS. It is also the largest U.S. corporation working in that area of involvement. FHI will be promoting condoms in the developing countries and training specialized personnel to diagnose and treat sexually transmitted diseases.”10

Poland Ends Subsidies for Birth Control Pills

The Polish government, which finances at least 70 percent of all medicines, has eliminated subsidies for birth control pills, more than tripling their price. Ursula Kujawaska, a Ministry of Health spokeswoman, defended the administrative directive saying: “Avoiding pregnancy is not a sickness. The Ministry has a right to decide what a drug is and what it is not. Oral contraceptives are not.”

In addition to the subsidy cut, the government is removing four of the country’s birth control pills from the market on the grounds that they were unhealthy.11

European Economic Community in Bangladesh

“In what some see as a model for future population projects in developing countries, a $600 million assistance program organized by the World Bank teams several major donors in an orchestrated population effort in Bangladesh.”

Dr. C.O. Pannenborg, population and health specialist for the World Bank Group said the new program is directed by a “consortium of donor organizations” known as the Bangladesh Population and Health Consortium.

The European Economic Commission (EEC) provided $47.8 million to the program most of which is earmarked for the purchase and distribution of condoms. EEC is the third largest contributor after the World Bank which is providing $130 million. The remainder of the funding comes from a host of countries, including Bangladesh, Japan, Australia and several European nations.

Shortage of Doctors as Abortionists

Experts predict that the ob/gyn who will perform an abortion as part of his practice may be on the verge of extinction.

A 1985 study by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists revealed that more than two-thirds of the gynecologists in the nation will not perform abortions. A recent report by the National Abortion Federation found that only half of all residency programs offer training in abortion techniques. Since only 50% of those programs present abortion training as an option, “the programs show low residency participation.”12

Johns Hopkins Receives Award for Limiting Family Size

“For nearly a decade, Phyllis T. Piotrow and Patrick L. Coleman, two Johns Hopkins University public health communications specialists, have worked to develop and disseminate mass media campaigns promoting family planning and sexual responsibility in developing countries around the world. Mr. Coleman has just returned from the Philippines where he is the Hopkins center’s senior advisor.

The Charles Dana Foundation extended its Award for Pioneering Achievements in Health and Education in a ceremony in New York for “launching a far-reaching alliance between health professionals and popular entertainers to reach millions of men and women with memorable messages.”

“Armed with a grant from the U.S. Agency for International Development and a mandate to reach more people, Ms. Piotrow and Mr. Coleman decided to use the mass media to deliver the message.” Their first successful program aimed at youth was launched in Mexico in 1986, with teen idols Tatiana Palacios and Johnny Lozada. That ‘success’ was followed by campaigns in the Philippines featuring songs by Lea Salonga and in Nigeria with recording star King Sunny Ade. In Turkey the program’s primary target audience was married women, their husbands and public policy makers. After the campaign in Turkey, 250,000 were fitted with IUDs. “What we’ve shown is [these campaigns] will change the behavior of some people.”13

Quotable Quotes from Population Manics

Planned Parenthood’s Margaret Sanger: “More from the fit, less from the unfit.”

Population Council’s former vice president, Paul Demeny, saw the population problem as “evolutionary” i.e., “the eventual displacement of the slower growing population by the faster growing one.”14

Document submitted at the Nuremberg trials: It is known that racially inferior offspring of Eastern workers and Poles is to be avoided if at all possible. Although pregnancy interruptions ought to be carried out on a voluntary basis only, pressure is to be applied in each of these cases.15

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