# 10 million preventable child deaths per year? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 31, 2008, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310 "2008-12-31T02:46:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Telcontar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3bc359/32.png) [@Telcontar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telcontar)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310/21 "2009-01-02T19:12:03Z")
> [@CalD](#): > > Thanks for the responses, guys. > > Why has the world community failed these children so badly? Is the task too great? Is it logistically impossible? The world is a strange place. A bit of context: Aid to Israel, a country of 7 million: about 2 billion a year. Humanitarian and developmental aid to Africa in 2001: about 1.4 billion a year. This is a rare issue where I think Bush deserves some credit. He dramatically increased funding to fight malaria: [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/30/AR2006123000941\_pf.html](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/30/AR2006123000941_pf.html) The US (and the West in general, I suppose) chooses some very strange things to care about. Sexy military crisis in country with historical ties? $$$$. Massive public health problem that could be easily treated if only people cared? Zip. > **[Iodine deficiency](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iodine_deficiency)** > > Iodine deficiency is a lack of the trace element iodine, an essential nutrient in the diet. It may result in metabolic problems such as goiter, sometimes as an endemic goiter as well as congenital iodine deficiency syndrome due to untreated congenital hypothyroidism, which results in developmental delays and other health problems. Iodine deficiency is an important global health issue, especially for fertile and pregnant women. It is also a preventable cause of intellectual disability. > Iodine i... ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310/22 "2009-01-02T19:13:24Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > I disagree. If the only thing that’s worthwhile in your life is the idea of children, you may as well just kill yourself now, because those children will in turn grow up and all THEY have to look forward to is their children, and so on and so on in a never ending cycle. If lifes only purpose is to perpetuate itself despite all the suffering that ensues because of that perpetuation, what’s the point? Are we just salmon, living to spawn and die? It’s not the idea of children, it’s the children themselves. There’s no “point” to anything, really, but the pleasure of watching your own children be born and grow and develop and turn into adults is as real as any other pleasure. What’s the point of art or music or anything else man creates? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310/23 "2009-01-02T19:23:41Z")
> [@MandaJo](#): > > It’s not the idea of children, it’s the children themselves. Before children are created, they are mere abstractions, not tangible entities. The motivation behind creating a child is not for the _child’s_ sake, but the parents sake. That is, when there’s even a motivation at all and the child is not merely a byproduct of the parents desire to have sex. To create a child knowing full well that this child will grow up in abject poverty and may even starve to death is a great evil. To have birth control be available, and yet refuse to use it when you can’t be sure you’ll even be able to feed the resultant child or care for its medical needs is morally inexcusable, and the parents desire to have children to see (some of them) grow up does not justify it. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310/24 "2009-01-02T19:26:40Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > Before children are created, they are mere abstractions, not tangible entities. The motivation behind creating a child is not for the _child’s_ sake, but the parents sake. That is, when there’s even a motivation at all and the child is not merely a byproduct of the parents desire to have sex. > > To create a child knowing full well that this child will grow up in abject poverty and may even starve to death is a great evil. To have birth control be available, and yet refuse to use it when you can’t be sure you’ll even be able to feed the resultant child or care for it’s medical needs is morally inexcusable. To what standard? Most of the people in Africa expect to raise kids in much the same style they, themselves, were raised, in much the same style as 90% of the world was raised up until a hundred years ago or so. Were all Western peasants morally degenerate for having children? What’s different now? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310/25 "2009-01-02T19:43:40Z")
> [@MandaJo](#): > > To what standard? Most of the people in Africa expect to raise kids in much the same style they, themselves, were raised, in much the same style as 90% of the world was raised up until a hundred years ago or so. Were all Western peasants morally degenerate for having children? What’s different now? It’s less understandable now. Humans have a very strong desire to have sex. And up until about a hundred years ago, having babies was an inevitable byproduct of this strong urge. But birth control methods are now readily available. Do apes and chimps plan on having offspring? I doubt it. Do you think cavemen were thinking “OG WANT BABY!” No, Og wanted sex. A baby just sort of happened. Evolution, an unthinking process, has through chance generated rational beings who can choose for themselves. Animals procreate unthinkingly because it is in their instinct. But we have the power, through technology, to satisfy our animal nature while minimizing the negative consequences. I think there are two ideal options for the future of humanity that I’ve previously posted about: go [extinct](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=496735) or be [remade](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=494807) by genetic engineering into “transhumans” who don’t suffer and are motivated not by fear of pain but by gradients of bliss. Anything less is just selling ourselves short of our potential. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310/26 "2009-01-02T20:01:08Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > I think there are two ideal options for the future of humanity that I’ve previously posted about: go [extinct](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=496735) or be [remade](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=494807) by genetic engineering into “transhumans” who don’t suffer and are motivated not by fear of pain but by gradients of bliss. Anything less is just selling ourselves short of our potential. Well, uh, whats the point of that? It’s all kind of pointless when you get down to it. This is why religion is so popular. Anyway, much of Africa has a communal society that gives great respect to ancestors. People have this whole other sense of themselves defined by their family, their tribe and their land. It’s just not something many Americans have. We are so used to being ourselves and that is it. In my area, when you had a kid you spend the rest of your life being knowns as _your first kid’s name_ _dad or mom_. Even the most illiterate peasant could recite their family line going back seven generations. I can barely manage three. I knew a guy who did skull worship. He had the skulls of his family for the last three hundred years in his family’s private temple, and gained great joy from the fact that he’d be there one day and his daughters and sons would pay their respects. There is a real sense of continuity and history through family lines. It’s something very important to people. If anything, the people in my community’s life were a lot less “spawn and die” than our own. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310/27 "2009-01-02T21:48:01Z")
> [@even\_sven](#): > > Well, uh, whats the point of that? It’s all kind of pointless when you get down to it. This is why religion is so popular. > > Anyway, much of Africa has a communal society that gives great respect to ancestors. People have this whole other sense of themselves defined by their family, their tribe and their land. It’s just not something many Americans have. We are so used to being ourselves and that is it. The American Dream is to get rich and own many flashy possesions, all too many of which were probably made in sweat shops in third world countries by workers who work 16 hours days and get paid 10 cents an hour to make shoes that sell for 100 bucks a pair. The human race continues to exist because we’re able to rationalise all this suffering as having some sort of noble purpose. Cultural brainwashing is a powerful force indeed. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-million-preventable-child-deaths-per-year/479310.md?page=1)