This post is from Population Matters.

See http://populationmatters.org/2011/blog/sex-ideology-religion-10-myths-world-population-growth/ where you can download a full copy of the paper by Richard Ottaway.

In 1804 there were 1 billion people in the world, in 1960 3 billion people and this year on the 31^st October the world population reaches 7 billion. The world population continues to grow with about 78 million people every year, more than the entire population of the UK.

This new Paper on Sex, Ideology and Religion: 10 Myths about Population Growth produced by Richard Ottaway MP and Genevieve Hutchinson challenges the key misunderstandings surrounding family planning and population growth. The myths:

• The population explosion is over; It’s far from over!
• Foreign aid is a waste of money and population growth is inevitable; Family Planning is one of the most cost-effective health interventions in the developing world
• Technology and human ingenuity will solve our problems; If our patterns of consumption are imitated, as others are striving to do, the world probably is not viable
• Development is the best contraception; No country has got itself out of poverty without first addressing population growth
• Educating women and they will have fewer children; Education in itself does not mean women will have fewer children
• Poor people choose to have large families to care for them in old age; Family size is the product of a complex combination of individual, socio-economic and cultural factors, and it often not the result of choice
• Family planning programmes are coercive; Family Planning is not telling women what to do – it‘s
  listening to what they want!
• Family Planning is against religious teaching; Family Planning is not against religious teaching
• HIV and other diseases will solve the population problem; and Not saving people is not an option
• It’s too late to do anything anyhow. It’s not too late!

Richard Ottaway, MP said: “The World needs to get wise to the challenges and dangers of mass population growth. The population explosion is not over and it is not too late to meet the unmet need for contraception. The 10 Myths about world population growth has stalled development and all the highly commendable work done to date to achieve the Millennium Development Goals will be in vain if this vital factor is ignored.”

Baroness Jenny Tonge said: “Whether we can end poverty, hunger and deprivation and still live together on a healthy planet depends on policy decisions that are made now in the developing and developed countries, including the UK. We must act now by fulfilling contraceptive needs.”

To read the paper: http://populationmatters.org/documents/ten_myths.pdf