9 July 2021
As we do not yet have a full picture of the impact of COVID-19 on fertility, alarmist concerns about a possible baby boom or bust are premature.
What should be troubling, however, are situations in which women cannot exercise their sexual and reproductive rights and choices—whether due to the inaccessibility of health services or gender discrimination. A woman who has control over her body and access to services to support her choices not only gains greater autonomy but also benefits from advances in health, education, income and safety. She is more likely to thrive, and so are her family and her society.
The global population has been growing for hundreds of years at a rate that has dipped and recovered with booms and busts. To focus solely on inconstant waves pushed and pulled by forces that are often out of our control is to lose sight of the shore, of the human rights that are our solid ground.
When The Population Bomb1 was published in 1968, it fed into a growing panic that overpopulation would doom the planet, whose finite resources could not support infinite population growth. The authors, Stanford University biologist Paul R. Ehrlich and Anne H. Ehrlich, predicted mass starvation in the face of an unstoppable demographic tide.
They and others presented apocalyptic scenarios—projections that hundreds of millions of lives would be claimed by famine. Such predictions instilled fear, but also ignited heartfelt concern for the health of the planet and gave rise to environmental activism, which has rightly endured.
The world didn’t end, of course, but the alarmism surrounding the issue of population continues. Now, more than 50 years after the publication of The Population Bomb, in a time of pandemic, there are fears of another demographic avalanche, this one in the opposite direction: a looming crisis of empty schools and ageing populations, a depleted workforce and ghost towns. This is the new population “time bomb”, a depopulation crisis which, according to breathless headlines that have cropped up with increasing frequency, threatens everything from eldercare to economies to the very existence of countries and cultures.
Midway between the emergence of these two dire predictions—at the 1994 in Cairo, Egypt—the world reached a rare consensus on the need to put trust in the wisdom of women and families who, when supported and offered choices, can make sound and sustainable choices. The groundbreaking Cairo consensus heralded a shift in focus from human numbers to human rights. The idea is that what really matters is not population, per se, but people. The affirmed that “advancing gender equality and equity and the empowerment of women, and the elimination of all kinds of violence against women, and ensuring women’s ability to control their own fertility, are cornerstones of population and development-related programmes.”
We have seen the wisdom and efficacy of this approach, including a greater emphasis on girls’ education and on sexual and reproductive health, rights and choices, play out around the world. Since 1994, access to voluntary modern contraception has increased by , and preventable maternal deaths declined , for example. And while much remains to be done, the increasing availability of comprehensive sexuality education—both in and out of school—is an indication that more countries recognize the critical role it plays in empowering young people and accelerating universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights.
Today, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, we find ourselves in a precarious situation. We have seen a global surge in domestic violence, as lockdowns left women and girls trapped at home with abusers and cut off from vital support. The pandemic has disrupted essential sexual and reproductive health services in many places, leading to a rise in unintended pregnancy and pregnancy-related complications and death. We see spikes in child marriage, adolescent pregnancy and female genital mutilation. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) towards ending gender-based violence and female genital mutilation by one third over the next decade, and we could see an additional 13 million child marriages.
As resources are diverted to battle the coronavirus, the pandemic is hindering progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, including SDG 3 on good health and well-being for all, and SDG 5 on gender equality.
Economic opportunity was another casualty of COVID-19. Women left the workforce in droves to shoulder much of the unpaid care and domestic work burden, from overseeing children’s remote learning to caring for elderly relatives. Their jobs, often low-paid and concentrated in the informal and service sectors, were among the hardest hit by the pandemic.
Yet even as women and girls grapple with this multilayered crisis, the cruel irony is that whether population numbers rise or fall, women continue to be held responsible. In the worst cases, where and when alarmist fears give rise to restrictive and coercive policies, women have faced abhorrent violations of their reproductive rights and bodily autonomy. In places where fertility is dropping, they may face restricted access to contraception. Where fertility is rising, they may be subjected to forced sterilization or coercive family planning.
The present crisis has jeopardized the futures of untold numbers of women and girls. Let’s not inflict another crisis on them as well. Instead of asking women what their duty is to the human race, the question should be, what is our duty to them?
Behind the numbers are individuals who, in deciding whether, when or how to become a parent, should be supported at every level. Communities should celebrate women’s choices. Institutions and governments should enable, rather than impede, decisions made freely and backed by accurate information. That means supporting quality health care, including sexual and reproductive health care that encompasses voluntary family planning and safe childbirth. It means supporting comprehensive sexuality education. And it means doing the hard work of advancing gender equality by improving girls’ access to education; championing pay parity, with wages based on skills, experience and education, not gender; and creating dependable, affordable childcare as well as flexible work and family leave policies. None of this is revelatory, but it could be revolutionary.
Since the International Conference on Population and Development, we have had more than a quarter century of agreement that women’s reproductive rights, equality and agency are fundamental to the well-being and prosperity of all. Whether we face a baby boom or bust in the short term, our priority for the long term must be upholding those rights and choices for the benefit of people and the planet.
Note
1Paul R. Ehrlich, The Population Bomb (New York, Ballantine Books, 1968).
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