- The population of our planet will increase
to 8 billion by the end of 2026, according to the U.S. Census Bureau brief
World Population Profile: 1998
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- World population continues to rise, according
to a U.S. Census Bureau report released Friday, despite a decline in developing-country
fertility rates that began in the 1970s and in some countries the toll
taken by the HIV/AIDS pandemic.
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- The population of our planet will increase
to 8 billion by the end of 2026, according to the census brief World Population
Profile: 1998, and will reach 9.3 billion by 2050. The world's population
will pass the 6 billion mark this year.
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- While the rate of increase is slowing,
according to the report, the global population increase is equivalent to
adding a new Israel, Egypt, Jordan, West Bank and Gaza to the existing
world total each year.
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- The rate of population growth is largely
being decided by less affluent nations according to the report. Ninety-six
percent of world population growth occurs in the developing regions of
Africa, Asia and Latin America. This percentage is expected to increase
during the next 25 years. Ninety percent of the world's births and 77 percent
of its deaths took place in these less developed countries in 1998.
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- In more developed countries, on the other
hand, the Census Bureau report says that early in the next century "crude
death rates" will exceed "crude birth rates" and the difference
will be a negative number " a natural decrease. From about 2020 on,
the only variable affecting whether a more developed country increases
in population will be international migration.
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- The report also says substantial gaps
will continue to exist in fertility and infant mortality between more developed
and less developed countries. A baby born in sub-Saharan Africa is far
more likely to die in infancy than a child born in another developing region
and has a lower life expectancy than a child born anywhere else. A child
born in Latin America or Asia can expect to live between seven and 13 fewer
years on average than one born in one of the world's more affluent regions.
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- Current estimates of people infected
with HIV/AIDS worldwide are around 40 million people. It has claimed more
than 11 million people since its beginning in the late 1970s. The report
predicts that, even though most of the infections have occurred in sub-Saharan
Africa, the spread of disease in Asia in the coming years will account
for more infections than in sub-Saharan Africa.
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- "HIV/AIDS has had and continues
to have substantial and sometimes dramatic impacts on mortality levels
in countries most seriously affected," according to the report. "However,
AIDS will not overcome the momentum of population growth at the regional
level, even in sub-Saharan Africa."
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