Biomedical science is changing the lives of millions

The Population Council has its headquarters in New York and was established in 1952 by John D Rockefeller. It is governed by an international board of trustees which include "leaders in biomedicine, business, economic development, government, health, international finance, the media, philanthropy and social science."

They work in developed countries where they use "state-of-the-art biomedical science to develop new contraceptives and products to prevent the transmission of HIV."

The British medical journal Lancet said of the Population Council: "Most non-governmental organisations claim to promote change for the better; the Population Council actually has hard evidence of having changed the lives and expectations of hundreds of millions of people."

http://www.popcouncil.org/

So that`s good isn`t it?

Or is it?

 

Referring to a 1969 Population Council publication `Beyond Family Planning,`written by Bernard Berelson, it can be seen that the motivation behind the Council is less about changing things for the better and more about population control.

Berelson believes there is stress on voluntary family planning programmes as the `means of choice` to deal with the growth of human populations and presents alternative strategies.

"Liberalisation of induced abortion. Mass use of `fertility control agent` by government to regulate births at acceptable level; substance now unknown but believed to be available for field testing after 5 - 15 years of research work to be included in water supply in urban areas... Withdrawal of children or family allowances after the regulated number of children. Increase in minimum age of marriage through substantial fee for marriage licenses. Inclusion of population materials in primary and secondary school systems, perhaps family planning and sex education as well."

And so it goes on.

What is most fascinating is how many of these strategies have been introduced in the developed world as well, and to good effect, because birth rates can no longer sustain the indigenous populations. Whereas marriage licenses are not prohibitive, childhood has been extended with training, and more education, so that it takes forever to reach adult status by which time the adult is burdened with debt, and hardly in a position to think about marriage and a mortgage. But that`s ok, because these adults have been brought up knowing all about sex and contraception, for an `anything goes` society.

Which begs the question: Have sterilants ever been added to the water supply?

http://www.jstor.org/stable/1964767?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents