European regional conference on population and development:
European and American governments meeting at the European population and development conference in Geneva balked at committing themselves to a target for funding birth control programs in developing countries. They did agree, however, to increase spending for population activities which integrated health care for women and children with contraceptives. The nations rejected a proposal from the Scandinavian countries to increase spending on such programs to four percent of their foreign aid by the year 2000.
According to the report in the New Scientist, Desmond Curran of the British Overseas Development Administration, commented on this reluctance. “Targets,” he said, “can lead governments to spend money on projects regardless of their quality.” Britain spends 1.6 percent of its aid on population programs; the United States, which described targets as ‘inappropriate,’ spends two percent.
The article quoted a European demographer: “demographers have abandoned the belief that countries must become relatively wealthy and industrialized before people want to have fewer children .… opposition to population control, which was wide-spread at population conferences in 1974 and 1984, also seems to be dead. The U.S. has restored support for the UNFPA and other population agencies, after canceling it under pressure from anti-abortion groups in the 1980s” (Deborah MacKenzie, “West fiddles while population soars,” New Scientist, 3 Ap. 1993, 4)
Quality control in China:
A new eugenics and health protection law drafted in China introduces measures to avoid births of “inferior quality.” The measures include abortion, sterilization and delayed marriage. The new law was presented to the eighth National People’s Congress (NPC) standing committee. The minister of public health, Chen Minzhang, explained that the measures will help prevent infections and hereditary diseases, and protect the health of mothers and children.
Individuals with ailments such as hepatitis, venereal disease or hereditary mental illness will be banned from marrying while carrying the disease. Pregnant women diagnosed with particular infectious diseases or those carrying a defective child will be advised to terminate the pregnancy. Couples in those categories should be sterilized according to the draft.
Minister Chen explained that China now has more than ten million “disabled persons who could have been prevented through better controls.” He called on medical authorities at various levels to establish a comprehensive network for the implementation of the law (Xinhua general overseas news service, 20 Dec. 1993).
Targeting the Third World:
A meeting of ‘population experts’ in Paris have called for a ten year campaign to promote contraception in the Third World. Claiming that “overpopulation has already slashed the living standards of millions in the Third World” and that “770 million people are underfed,” the group set the agenda for the future. “[W]e must provide developing countries with 50 billion condoms, 11 billion oral contraceptives, 178 million sterilization operations and 400 million intrauterine devices over the next ten years,” said Dr. Sheldon Segal of the USAID-funded Population Council.
The ‘experts’ described economic, cultural and political barriers to success but encouraged a political commitment to cutting the birthrate by offering “cheap contraceptives compatible with their culture.” Bearing this in mind the scientists are now “working on contraceptive vaccines.”
Steven Sinding of the Rockefeller Foundation complained that developing countries “devote only 0.5 percent of their budget to promoting birth control” while international donors “have underinvested in such programs” (Benedicte Manier, “Ten year contraceptive badly needed in the Third World, Jakarta Post, 6 Jan. 1994).
Women’s groups protest new contraceptive vaccine:
Anti-fertility vaccines which trick the woman’s body into producing antibodies against sperm, eggs or reproductive hormones have been condemned by Third World women’s groups. The women protesters insist that “vaccines should defend against disease rather than attack the body’s own cells.”
Judith Richter, pharmacist and researcher, launched the campaign against immunological contraceptives in Amsterdam. “There are no true benefits for women and men who will use the method,” she said. Women’s groups sent an open letter of protest to organizations involved in funding or researching the vaccine. The letter was mailed to the World Bank, the United Nations Population Fund and foreign ministers in Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, India, Norway, Sweden and Denmark.
The U.S.Aid-funded Population Council also “advocates the development of new contraceptives based on choice.” “It’s been proven by independent research that the more methods that are available, the more people will use them, simply because women and men need options,” said spokeswoman Sandra Waldham. Women’s groups, however, continue to object: “[I]mmunological contraceptives would be unreliable, carry the risk of auto-Immune diseases, could not be ‘switched’ off at will” and leave women exposed to the AIDS virus, said Ms. Richter.
Indian health activist, Sumati Nair, says that women in India are being given the vaccine without informed consent and forced to sign consent forms in English which most could not understand (Abigail Levine, “New contraceptive ‘vaccine’ raises questions,” Jakarta Post, 14 December 1993).
Thai government aiding and abetting forced prostitution?:
Human Rights Watch has accused the Thai government of condoning the involvement of police and other Thai officials in the trafficking and forced prostitution of Burmese women.
In a report titled “A modern form of slavery,” Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai was accused of ignoring the trade in women due to fear of “confronting the sex industry’s ‘wealthy and powerful’ lobby.” The report went on to accuse officials of targeting the women victims for arrest rather than rescuing them. While many of the women and girls brought to Thailand are virgins when they arrive, a majority of them return with AIDS.
Although Thai law protects the victims from fines or imprisonment, Thai officials continue to arrest and detain them; engaging in a “new round of extortion and sexual abuse” through “the pervasive fear…of being handed back to Burmese authorities” (Jim Wolf, “Group alleges official Thai role in sex trade,” Reuter, 30 Jan. 1994, Wash., D.C.).
U.S. acknowledges radiation tests:
U.S. Government records reveal past radiation experimentation on U.S. citizens. President Clinton has named a panel of scientists to review human radiation data discovered through a government-wide search. A civilian advisory panel is expected to review “the hundreds of thousands of documents on reported tests conducted on human subjects.” Record searches will be conducted in the Energy Department, the Department of Defense, Veterans Affairs, the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and Health and Human Services (Washington Post, 12 Jan. 1994).
A sign of the times?:
A “key commission” in London has recommended the closing of two-thirds of the city’s 36 churches by the Church of England. The Churches, which are reported to have congregations of “fewer than ten,” offer 130 services during the working week. A number of these churches, known for their architecture, could be turned into “crowd-pulling gymnasiums, shops or wine bars if the recommendations are accepted (Richard Meares, “Shut most churches in city of London…,” Reuter, 28 Jan. 1994).
U.S. to use women to address population problem:
In an interview with Greenwire, Timothy Wirth, the Clinton Administration’s “Global Counselor” to the U.S. State Department, was asked to explain the difference between his work and what had been done at the State Department before. Wirth is reported to have redefined post-Cold War national security as “population stabilization, environmental protection, sustainable development and democratic institutions .… All of these,” he continued, “are important elements of our ability to pursue our national interests around the world and maintain the security of the United States.”
Exemplifying UNICEF’s promise to use “women and children as a Trojan Horse,” Wirth has determined to “reverse the ignorance of the last administration” and redefine population to include “child health programs, wo1nen’s reproductive health programs and women’s education programs.”
“What we’d like to do in Cairo is one, come up with an unambiguous and clearly defined policy on global population stabilization and giving women choice. Second, we would like to be able to say to the world, ‘We are serious about this,’ not only rhetorically, but also in terms of the [financial] resources that we are willing to put into it. Third, we would like to develop a set of new partnerships with major countries around the world.”
He described the “partnerships” as entailing “very strong, clearly defined partnerships with donor nations like Japan and the European Community, and recipient countries like Egypt, Indonesia, Colombia and Mexico .… I hope we will then come out of Cairo with an increased determination to move into those countries where programs are desperately needed…Northern India, Pakistan, a lot of sub-Saharan Africa.”
In response to a reporter’s question about the possibility of negative reactions to “this new commitment” Wirth responded: “There are people who say that you have no business helping to assist family planning clinics around the world, but this is the same sort of deliberate, wanton ignorance that defined population policy in the 19SOs and the American people just said no to that” (Text: Greenwire interview with Timothy Wirth, 24-25 Jan. 1994, reprinted from Greenwire, the daily briefing on the Environment).
Beijing model of ‘reproductive health’:
Two Chinese hospital officials were condemned to death and four others were jailed because of helping women avoid sterilizations required by China’s official birth control policies. The Henan Legal News reported on 22 November 1993 that the six were convicted of taking the equivalent of $32,750 in bribes for providing 448 falsified sterilization papers between 1988 and 1990.
The article reported that Yu Jian’an, a vice director of the No. 2 People’s Hospital in Henan’s Lin county, was sentenced to death while the hospital affairs director, Sun Changsheng, received a two-year suspended death sentence. Yuan Baochang, a family planning official and three farmers, were imprisoned for terms of up to life. The men were convicted at a public trial in Anyang (“Henan to execute birth control violators,” AFP, Beijing, 1 Dec. 1993).
Suicide in the Netherlands:
The Dutch euthanasia statute permits assisted suicide if the “mercy-killing” guidelines are followed. Ian Hilarius, who runs a suicide hotline operating out of Amsterdam, said in an interview, “We see suicide as a matter of self-determination. People have a right to choose their own life and death.” Another group, the Dutch Voluntary Euthanasia Society, also offers such assistance. Martine Comelisse, the program director, assists hot line callers find information on how to die and encourages patients to say goodbye to loved ones. The most common method in the Netherlands is hanging (“Netherlands-Suicide…,” APn, 9 Dec. 1993).
