Penna Dexter

Population policy received heavy scrutiny recently at the annual meeting of the United Nations Commission on Population and Development.

Julia-Elena Cazan reported on the meeting which was held at UN headquarters in New York. She wrote: “Governments voiced concerns that low fertility rates are threatening their societies with anemic economic growth, labor shortages, fiscal insolvency, and other social problems. But the UN population establishment insists it’s not a problem. Ms. Cazan says population bureaucrats, when confronted with these concerns, “tried to cast low fertility in a positive light.”

The UN has been able to convince some countries that population decline is a good thing and something to be pursued. But most are not buying it and are instead in a panic over steep declines in their populations.

Stefano Gennarini, Vice President for Legal Studies at the Center for Family and Human Rights, points out that “reality is catching up with the population control movement.” More and more countries,” he writes, “are awaking to the imminent threat of low fertility and aging in all societies.” Many “countries are reaping the horrific consequences of sixty years of anti-natalist programs and propaganda.”

According to Mr. Gennarini, “Currently, sexual and reproductive health is the number one item on the global health agenda. No other issue receives more funding.” But as countries suffer the harsh consequences of dwindling populations, and foresee worse down the road, they are questioning and scrutinizing the UN’s promotion of population control including reproductive health, i.e. abortion.

Western governments, including the U.S., constantly insist that “sexual and reproductive rights” become international human rights. They attempt to exclude “language in UN agreements that protects the sovereign right of countries to decide questions of abortion and the provision of transgender affirming care, on their own.”

International pressure on governments is only one of many factors causing the decline in fertility rates and population worldwide. But these declines in population signal thatwe should abolish the UN’s population control apparatus.