1. Key Issue 4: Why might the world face an overpopulation problem?
Chapter 3: Population
Key Issue 4:
Why might the world face an overpopulation problem?

2. Malthus Consequences: Thomas Malthus (1766-1834)
Population growth would press against available resources
Disease, famine, war would ensue
Thomas Malthus ( )
Essay on the Principle of Population 1798
Population Growth vs Food Supply
Population growing too fast for food supply
Pop grows geometrically while population growths arithmetically
Example:
Today- 1 person, 1 unit of food
25 years- 2 people, 2 u.o.f.
50 years- 4 people, 3 u.o.f.
75 years- 8 people, 4 u.o.f

3. Neo-Malthusians Two problems even worse than in Malthus’ time
Malthus failed to anticipate that poor countries would have rapid pop growth
Resource gap wider than Malthus assumed
World pop is outstripping resources
Not just food production

4. Malthus’s Critics Economic development Unrealistically pessimistic
Poverty, hunger, etc. caused by lack of economic development with unjust social and economic institutions NOT population growth
More people = more power?
Political leaders in Africa
More pop = more men in army
Unrealistically pessimistic
Malthus based theory on idea that supply of resources is fixed, not expanding
Larger pop can stimulate economic growth
Malthus’s arithmetic – capitalism (Engels’ Theory)
Too few people can retard the economy just as too many
Resources should be shared equally

5. Reality Conditions last half-century do not support Malthus theory
Food production has increased dramatically
Green revolution
Wheat production X2
Slowed recently?

6. Declining Birth Rates
Food production increased more than Malthus predicted
Malthus’s model expected that the pop would quadruple but it didn’t
Rate of Natural Increase is decreasing
More deaths or less births
Exception LDCs

7. Reasons for declining birth rate
Economic Development:
lowering birth rates improve economic conditions
women more likely to attend school
increased knowledge of family planning
better health care programs

8. Distribution of Contraceptives
World can’t wait for economic improvement
LDC’s demand is greater than supply
Still is occurring
Bangladesh, Colombia, Morocco, Thailand
Has not spread to Africa
Reflects the status of women
Contraceptives a religious issue and political issue

9. India Became independent 1947
Began a population planning program in 1950’s
Census in 1960’s reveals extreme growth
During the 1970’s the Indian government began a policy of forced sterilization of any man with three or more children.
3.7 million were sterilized
Public outcry and opposition
Today sterilization is making a comeback
Propaganda now encouraging “small” families
India gendercide
China’s One Child Policy
Forced abortion

10. World Health Threats Epidemiologic transition: Epidemiology:
focuses on distinctive causes of death in each stage of the demographic transition
Epidemiology:
Branch of medical science concerned with the incidence, distribution, and control of diseases that affect large numbers of people

11. Epidemiologic Transition Stage 1 & 2
Stage 1: Pestilence and famine
Infectious and parasitic diseases were principal causes of human death
Malthus called these “natural checks”
Example:
Black Plague
Stage 2: Receding Pandemics
Pandemic is a disease that occurs over a wide and affects a very high proportion of the population
Industrial revolution helped slow spread of disease
Not immediately
Example:
Cholera

12. Black Plague Bubonic plague Worst stage 1 case
From Kyrgyzstan brought by Tatar army
Spread from urban areas to rural areas
Western Europe 1348
Northern Europe 1349
Wiped out entire villages and families
United States- 25 million died
China – 13 million died

13. Cholera Stage 2 Pandemic: disease occurs over a wide geographic area
Poor people crowded into industrial cities
½ million in NYC died in 1832
1/8th population of Cairo 1831
Geographic Models the key to understanding
Edwin Chadwick ( )
Residents in poorer neighborhoods had higher incidences of Cholera
Dr. John Snow ( )
Mapped distribution of deaths in London
Not a cause of sinful behavior
Water pumps the cause

14. Stages 3 & 4 Stage 3: Degenerative and human-created diseases
characterized by a decrease in deaths from infectious deaths and chronic disorders associated with aging
Cardiovascular disease
cancer
Decline in infectious diseases has been sharp in stage 3 countries
Recently LDCs recently moved from stage 2 to stage 3
Effective vaccines
Stage 4: delayed degenerative diseases
Cardiovascular disease and cancer still linger but life expectancy extended
Improved healthcare
Improving behaviors as well
Better diet
Reduced use of tobacco, alcohol, and exercise

15. Stage 5 ????
Stage of reemergence of infectious diseases and parasitic disease
Old and new have emerged
Three reasons:
Evolution
Microbes evolved, changed = resistant
Example: Malaria
Poverty
TB in LDCs
Long, expensive treatment
Improved travel
H1N1