China’s population school addresses “education and quality of services”
China’s State Family Planning Commission recently founded the nation’s first “Population School” in Jinan, the capital city of Shandong Province. The school has 60 teachers who are “expected to train a large number of specialized personnel.” According to school master Hong Shengzhi, the newly trained personnel will be expected to carry out family planning programs throughout the country. One hundred thirty-five students are currently enrolled in three courses of Family Planning Technology, Population and Family Planning Statistics, and Family Planning Administration (IPS, Jinan, Xinhua, 5 October 1992).
The Minister of AIDS is coming!
The Malayasian Health Minister, Lee Kim Sai, poor fellow, is frustrated! His energetically promoted “AIDS Campaign” keeps running into obstacles as he pushes “safe sex” programs.
Malayasian Moslems have objected to an AIDS video because it showed a couple kissing. Condom machines were rejected when it was suggested that the machines would foster “illicit sex.” “We feel our hands are tied,” said Lee, “But we are not going to give up easily just because we have encountered resistance based on moral and religious taboos.” Now when people see Lee coming they say, “the Minister of AIDS is coming.”
Malayasia’s AIDS incidence is highly concentrated among drug users. Of 3,735 AIDS carriers, 3046 were drug addicts. Malayasian men, however, are reported to visit prostitutes in nearby parts of Thailand.
“Using condoms is one way to control (AIDS) but according to religious values the condom is prohibited,” Lee said, “We say we are not promoting contraceptives as a contraceptive, but … to avoid contracting HIV,” said Lee. “And then the moral issue comes in, and they say how can you ask people to use condoms when you should be asking them to stop going to prostitutes” (Ho Kay Tat, “Malayasia’s war against AIDS runs into wall of taboos,” Reuter, Kuala Lampur, 23 October 1992).
Nigerians warned of population control danger
Nigerian and American organizations have warned Nigerians about the dangers of population control programs. The Sunday Vanguard reports that the organizations (names withheld) located in the northern part of Nigeria and the Washington area of the United States viewed the $100 million USAID “family health initiative programme” as a program for “population shrinkage.” The organizations accused USAID of using local broadcast operations to “erode resistance to American population management in Nigeria.”
Health Minister professor Ransome-Kuti insisted that the “child-spacing program” is being pursued in the interest of the Nigerians.” He stated, “Whether at this point in time, the population of Nigeria is 38.5 million or 120 million is of little significance…more growth and population momentum and the consequences of these on the national economy, health, education, social services and above all on the quality of lives of Nigerians are what matter.”
Nevertheless, critics of the programme maintain that the $173 million being spent on the “child spacing” program should have been spent on the “cash strapped industrial sector” (Segun Joseph, John Nwokocha, “Danger ahead for Nigeria on population control with U.S. aid,” Sunday Vanguard, 10 May 1992).
Ransome-Kuti — “sterilize the men!”
With grim determination to pursue the Nigerian “too many people myth,” Health Minister Ransome-Kuti complained that Nigerian men have “been less willing to use contraceptives” than the women in the country, therefore he recommends that Nigerian men be sterilized. But the Nigerian Guardian reminded its readers, “When population planning efforts border upon an attack on the freedom and rights of individuals to generate offspring in accordance with their conscience, then of course higher issues would be raised than material well-being.” The Guardian continued, “Forms of unwarranted pressure, of discrimination and subtle coercion, constitute sufficient attempts to abridge or tamper with this freedom.”
In a society that still places a high premium on children, a vigorous crusade in aid of sterilization could offend the people, many of whom “suspect that this crusade” is an “orchestrated agenda set outside our shores” (“Caution over sterilization,” The Guardian, 2 September 1992).
Throw the parents out of politics!
The Chief minister of Maharasftra, India, Sudhakar Rao Naik, said that jobs in public companies or government should be denied to parents with more than two children. He further insisted “People with larger families should also be ineligible for elected office or forced to resign if they have a third child while in office.”
Maharashtra’s “planning board” proposed increasing cash incentives for sterilization to 500 rupees, which is the equivalent of one month’s salary. It was also suggested families with daughters should be “discouraged from trying to have boys,” and the age for marriage should be raised to 21 rather than 18 (The Associated Press, Bombay, 9 September 1992).
American TB cases increased by 16 percent
A 16 percent increase in the incidence of tuberculosis has occurred in the United States between 1985 and 1991.
The AIDS epidemic, which dismantles the human immune system, is seen as a “critical factor” in the situation. “Eventually,” says Dr. Arata Kochi of the World Health Organization, “at least half” of the AIDS patients who carry the tuberculin bacteria will come down with the disease. Dr. Kochi describes AIDS as “the greatest risk factor” for tuberculosis today.
In addition, virulent drug-resistant strains of TB are spreading rapidly. A bacterium can become drug-resistant when a patient fails to take the full course of antibiotics which allows more drug-resistant bacteria to survive and breed. Eventually this produces a drug-resistant strain. It has been predicted that drug-resistant strains will become the most common form of TB unless effective action is taken (Ken Chowder, “How TB survived its own death to confront us again,” Smithsonian Magazine, November 1992).
Fertility in Italy and Spain
Fertility rates in Italy, Spain, and Portugal are among the lowest of any large population in the world. The decline in fertility began in those countries by the end of World War I, and has continued to decline. The age of marriage has increased. The total fertility rate (TFR) declined from 1975–1990 from 2.18 to 1.39 in Italy and from 2.78 to 1.39 in Spain. After legalization, abortion increased 25 %, then leveled off (M. Perez and M, Livi-Bacci,”The lowest in the world,” Family Planning Perspectives, July/August 1992, 162–171).
UNFPA’s “Ideal” Couple in Botswana
Poleontle Shaki Kebaswele and his wife Nonofo live in the capital city of Gaborone and, “‘[t]hey feel that family planning should be at the centre of their relationship.” “We need to regulate and control our birth rate so that our resources can cope,” says Kebaswele, an Assistant Finance officer in the secretariat of the Southern African Development Co-ordination Conference. UNFPA describes the economic conditions which are fostered in modern cities like Gaborone: “…both partners are working to raise their kids and meet the high cost of living. Lack of housing has sent rental prices sky-high, in some cases gobbling half their income or more. The school fees charged by the better schools add to the load.”
Kebaswele and Nonofo were married in 1986 and have three children with two years between each. “This gives the children the opportunity to get the proper care from parents and also gives Nonofo time to get her figure back,” Kebaswele explains, “When you marry a woman you want her to retain her beauty” (“Planning the family for a better future,” Press copy, The State of World Population 1992, UNFPA).
Mexico’s abortion fight threatens population control program
The aggressive promotion of birth-control pills and intrauterine devices by MEXFAM, IPPF’s Mexican affiliate, has been attacked by church leaders and the national Pro-Vida committee. They claim the contraceptives encourage immorality and even induce abortions.
“Contraception is one step away from abortion,” says the president of Pro-Vida, Jorge Serrano Limon, a father of seven. “It encourages couples to have sexual relations for reasons other than having children. Then, when the contraceptives fail, a woman may feel she has no recourse but to abort.”
Mexfam leaders and some U.S. experts worry that the campaign could force retreats in the battle to control Mexico‘s population growth. They claim that the “outcome will reverberate in the United States, where illegal immigration by millions of workers seeking jobs and where pollution from overcrowded border cities have political and social implications in California and other states.”
Mexico’s government for years has supplied free counseling and contraceptives at its health clinics. But Pro-Vida complains that the government inserts IUDs without patient’s knowledge during other treatments. Total external financing of the Mexican Population program includes: UNFPA $37,303,526; World Bank $1 million; World Health Organization $4 million; Family Planning International Assistance (Planned Parenthood Federation of America) $27,818,385; IPPF $1,294,400 (1989), $1,324,800 (1990 est.), $1,479,000 (1991 projected); and major USAID-funded groups, Association for Voluntary Surgical Contraception (AVSC) $372,000 (1987–91), Pathfinder Fund $1,775,278 (1989–91), Population Council $1,210,322 (1987–91), Program for Appropriate Technology (PATH) $758, 398 (1987–91). The U.S. also funds IPPF western hemisphere.
Mr. Serrano describes the effort as “savage.” He said, “The U.S., which is in a recession, wants to sell its luxury products.” “But, of course, a family with 10 children could not afford a VCR, for instance. The large family has to spend its money on necessities, food and clothes” (“Abortion fight threatens effort to stem Mexico’s soaring population,” The Journal of Commerce, 1 October 1992).
Birth control pill still illegal in Japan
The March 18th 1992 issue of the Japanese newspaper, Daily Yomiuri, reported that the Koseisho (Ministry of Health) withheld the legalization of the birth control pill. Apparently the Koseisho believes that the pill will “trigger promiscuity in the Japanese society. “In consideration of the public safety during the AIDS era, the Koseisho chose to discourage the liberalization of sexual behavior in Japan.
The Japanese also have a history of concern about the health effects for women taking the pill. The Koseisho have, however, permitted the hormone pill to be used for the treatment of menstrual disorders and other gynecological problems. In 1987 the Koseisho undertook a 3-year clinical trial program on oral contraceptives in light of the availability of lower dosage hormone pills. Twelve Japanese pharmaceutical companies, some in “partnership with foreign companies such as Schering, Syntex, Wyeth, Ortho and so on” applied for product approval. In a poll published by the Mainichi newspaper in 1990 women were asked if they would use oral contraceptives if and when they became legal. Only 9.9 % said they would use them; 46.6% would refuse to use the pill (Sumie Uno, “The oral contraceptive pill in Japan,” Issues in Reproductive Engineering, Vol. 5, No. 3, 1992, 253).
