SOCIAL WRONGS
A bedmate and unavoidabble consequence of poverty is hunger, which in turn resu;lts in malnutrition and starvation. There are many regions of the world where subsistence agriculture is presently the best that can be achieved, and productivity is chronically low. In addition, many of these regions also happen to be places wherein there is constant rapid population growth. Often a grim net effect inevitably follows wherein food production falls farther and farther behind population expansion. Among these sad cases are places such as sub-Saharan Africa and Bangladesh. They have been characterized by some experts as a sort of "Fourth World," wherrein poverty and starvation afflict hundreds of millions of human beings, and where there is at present little hope for improvement.
Another unhappy statistic is contained in the statement that fifty percent of mankind consumes about eighty five percent of the world's food production; while the other fifty percent must be satisfied with the remaining fifteen percent. In 2000, it was estimated that approximately 800 million human beings lacked sufficient food. It was further projected that the number of people thus suffering from acute malnutrition would increase rather than diminish in the years ahead. Particularly sorrowing is the estimate that one third of all children in our world are undernourished; and that a large percentage of these children suffer from the severe form of malnutrition that is frequently fatal.
Together with poverty and hunger, the third member of what constitutes an unholy trinity is disease. Many infectious and parasitic diseases can be overcome by simple improvements to our environment, and other preventive measures. In addition, our current arsenal of medical advances can usually successfully conquer many outbreaks when they occur. However, unfortunately, lack of adequate funds causes chronic inadequacy of surveillance and preventive measures in many less developed areas. This, coupled with existing dangerous ecological factors in these places, continue to trigger tragic episodes of mass illness.
Furthermore, in many poverty-stricken places, preventive and defensive medical measures are beyond reach--thus making epidemics a real possibility. While tragedies of mammoth proportion, such as the influenza epidemic of 1918-19 that claimed 25 to 50 million lives are less likely today, more moderate outbreaks, that might claim only ten million lives, remain a threat, especially in less developed parts of our world.
Another pathetic circumstance that exists in many poverty-stricken places is expressed in the statistics telling us that four million children uneder five years of age residing in such places die each year from diarrhea, which is a condition that is readily manageable. A further four million succumb to other preventable and treatable childhood ailments, such as measles, polio, diptheria, and tuberculosis. Add to this another two million youngsters struck down annually by causes such as plain and simple malnutrition and unsafe water, and we behold a shocking grand tally of at least ten million deaths each year--or thirty thousand each day--striking children under five years of age--deaths that could have been easily prevented. Stated in another fashion, the grim fact is that, in the poorest countries, one in five children is doomed to die before his or her fifth birthday.
Population is another issue, and deservant of serious concern and control. But once a child is born, he or she deserves a "shot at life." No child should suffer or perish because of absence of food, safe drinking water, or readily obtainable drugs or treatment for common ailments and inujuries. And once an individual does survive past childhood, he or she should have access to living conditions and medical facilities that will enable this person to live well beyond the age of thirty six--which is the average life expectancy in Malawi; or forty eight--being the overall recent average age of death in all of sub-Saharan Africa.
Another grim specter of disease that reared its head relatively recently is the human devastation wrought by acquired immune deficiency syndrome, or "AIDS." In sub-Saharan Africa, 29.4 million people were said to be infected in 2003; and this number has only increased to date. In Malawi, close to ten percent of the population was said to be so infected in 2005; and over 650,000 had already perished from this dread disease. Since then, you can be certain, all such figures relating thereto have gone up dramatically and tragically.
A frightening realization consists of the fact that poverty, hunger, and disease complement and actually feed off each other. Hunger contributes to disease; sick people are unable to produce as much; such insufficieant production causes poverty--which in turn results in more hunger--and so on down a vicious spiral. This is why with each successive year, certain regions become more poverty-stricken, hungrier, and sicker.
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