6.6 Million Children Under the Age of Five Died Last Year from Mostly Easily Treatable Diseases

[unhappycamper]

http://www.opednews.com/articles/6-6-Million-Children-Under-by-Brian-McAfee-CHILDRENS-HEALTH-CARE_Children_Disease-Virus-Epidemics_Girls-131111-254.html

6.6 Million Children Under the Age of Five Died Last Year from Mostly Easily Treatable Diseases
OpEdNews Op Eds 11/11/2013 at 16:31:16
By Brian McAfee

6.6 million children under the age of five died last year from diseases that, in most cases, were easily treatable. Most of the deaths resulted from pneumonia, malaria, or diarrhea, 70 percent of them in Africa and Southeast Asia. Nearly half the deaths of children under five occurred in just five countries: the Democratic Republic of the Congo, China, India, Nigeria and Pakistan.

In the Congo, women and children have had to endure two decades of warfare. The period has been marked by thousands of displaced refugees, and by systematic rape and other atrocities by government soldiers and rebels against women. Western governments and capitalism prop up this system of abuse and violence, which is kept going by foreign mining of rare earth minerals for cell phones and other electronics.

Nigeria accounts for more than 30 percent of early childhood deaths for malaria and for 20 percent of deaths attributable to HIV/AIDS. According to the UN, Nigeria accounts for one in every eight child deaths--a trend that must be combated.

Other places where conditions are dire for tens of thousands of children include Cambodia, Guinea, Mozambique and Nepal. In Nepal more than 26,000 children die before age five, according to a Save the Children report.

[brett_jv]

1. As sad as this is ...

I'm personally of the opinion that the optimal solution is to hand out free birth control and teach people how to use it properly. You can hand out meds and vaccines and such and keep them alive for a while but most of these areas are so impoverished and incapable of supporting their large populations (in a basic 'ecological' sense I'm referring to the region's 'carrying capacity') that all you really do is keep people alive for a little bit longer, only to die due to famine or drought or ... wars ...

The best solution is to teach people how to not have so many kids in areas that can't support so many people IMHO ...

[Aristus]

2. Well, if they had just gone out and gotten jobs as janitors, they would have been able to PAY

for their care!...