Canadians and population.

Toronto--Amidst the customary alarmist cries about the world's overpopulation, two Canadian voices recently piped up with the unorthodox view that, in fact, the crisis the world faces is an aging and rapidly dwindling population. (The prolife movement has been trying to point out this for years.)

Typical of the alarmists was an article in the Toronto Star which announced the birth of India's billionth citizen. It was filled with images of an impoverished land teeming with destitute people with barely enough room to move (Aug. 16, 1999). Nothing was said about India's huge middle class of over 300 million.

But different views came from David Frum in the National Post (Aug. 14, 1999) and Max Singer, in an article in the August 1999 issue of MacLean's magazine. Both pointed out that in order for a population to remain constant, the replacement birth rate must be 2.1 children per woman. Most countries have fallen below that: China has a birth rate of 1.8, with birth rates in Canada, Western Europe and Japan hovering around 1.5. Without replacement, the population will plummet in the next fifty years.

Frum, for example, noted that in Canada, there will be only two working people for every retiree by 2025; contrast this with 5.7 workers for every senior today. "Earth," he wrote, "is about to become Planet Geezer."

Neither Frum nor Singer mentioned abortion. Perhaps some day they will. Let us not forget that through abortion over two million Canadian lives have been snuffed out since 1969. Worldwide, the loss of life through abortion in the last two decades has been estimated at two billion. This is the real cause of the aging process now underway which will threaten the viability of every country in another 30 years.

Moncton--Despite this, federal Canadian policy supports population control. Senator Rose-Marie Losier-Cool, of Moncton, N.B., declared in July that she wanted population to be discussed at the World Francophone Summit, to be held in her hometown in September.

Losier-Cool is the president of the Canadian Association of Parliamentarians on Population and Development. She wants to see this issue placed on the "international agenda in as many forums as possible."

And in those international forums, the official Canadian delegation has been relentlessly comprised of "anti-people ideologues". The pro-life lobby group in New York, the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute, noted that Canadian advisors at preparatory meetings at The Hague and New York for the Cairo+5 conference on population and development (see CI, Sept. 1999, p. 24) included such pro-population control advocates as Carol Vlassoff of CIDA, and Daniele Testelin, of the Foreign Affairs department.

Included in Canada's pro-abortion NGO sector as observers on the official delegation was Ann Phillips from Women's Health in Women's Hands, and Michael Shenstone, chairman of Action Canada for Population and Development (ACPD), a front group for Planned Parenthood Federation of Canada (Source: Michael Brady, Vivant, Mar. 25, '99).