University of Virginia Library

Expert Sees Population As
World's Greatest Pollutant

By Dick Hickman
and Mike Leech
Cavalier Daily Staff Writers

Focusing on the population explosion,
yesterday afternoon's VIEW program
opened with Lee Bean of the Population
Council, speaking on "Prospects for
Population Control," and Richard
Termin, from the Department of Biology
at William and Mary, speaking on "The
Sociobiology of Population Control: An
Experimental Approach."

After a short break, Ernest O.
Attinger, Chairman of Biomedical
Engineering here at the University,
moderated a panel discussion on
"Population and Human Environment."
Besides Messrs. Bean and Termin, the
panel included J.J. Speidel, Chief of the
Research Division of the Agency For
International Development, and Dr.
Grover Pitts, from The University Medical
School's Department of Physiology.

World Overpopulated

Mr. Speidel begin the panel discussion
by noting that the equivalent of the
population of the United States was being
added to the world every three years. With the
birth rates in Asia and Africa double those in
Europe or America there is a great need to
regulate fertility, even if we are able to solve
the peripheral issues of pollution and food
production. The theory of Zero Population
Growth may already be obsolete in many parts
of the earth, since "The world has already
surpassed its optimum population."

Citing the need for education in methods of
contraception in high school sex education
courses, Mr. Speidel noted that abortion was
still highly restricted. The controversy over oral
contraceptives has been heightened by the
recent Congressional hearings conducted by
Senator Gaylord Nelson.

According to Mr. Speidel, the dangers of
The Pill should be weighed against the risks of
other drugs and even normal pregnancy. The
death rate among women using oral
contraceptives is 3 per 100,000 (175 deaths last
year), while that for normal childbearing is 25
per 100,000, or over 1000 deaths last year.

In fact, smoking accounts for over 300,000
deaths per year, so, as Mr. Speidel concluded,
"If we are going to restrict the availability of
something, it should be cigarettes, not the Pill."

Next on the panel discussion, Mr. Pitts
explained that the multiplicity of global
problems now faced by mankind was resulting
in a "shortening of the fuses." The population
explosion, the nuclear arms race, and other
international issues all tend to make viable
solutions more difficult to achieve.

Speaking of America's obligation to the
world, Mr. Pitts called upon our society to
stabilize our own population and lower our
level of consumption. According to Paul
Ehrlich, "America is plundering the planet in
order to maintain its affluent level of
consumption."

The solution to overconsumption, including
the great masses of junk mail and excess
packaging, will necessarily involve the
elimination of thousands, perhaps even millions
of jobs in our economy. No doubt there will be
active lobbying against any such proposals.

In the opening portion of the afternoon's
program, Lee Bean, of the Population Council,
discussed the problems of family planning in
underdeveloped nations and in the United
States.

In underdeveloped nations, a large
percentage of the population is left uninformed
about methods of contraception. Population
control, remarked Mr. Bean, is more than a
problem of preventing starvation, but involves
economic and social dimensions, and questions
of health, the quality of life, and the use of
environmental resources.

The past ten years has witnessed a dramatic
increase in the number of nations which have
adopted policies towards population control.
The United States, he added, is not among the
nations which have committed themselves to
population control.