6 ms·

African child mortality: The best story in development

79 points by ph0rque 14y ago

J3L2404 14y ago
Stories like this often don't get traction because it doesn't play into the news narrative. Doom sells. EDIT: Why is that? Why does doom sell?
- geuis 14y ago
  People are gossip machines. We innately talk to each other, about each other. It's one thing that has led us to develop culture. Or it might be because of culture. Anyway, people spread good news: Good harvest!, job promotion, new baby! But we also spread rumors, true or not. When you combine small village communication, then ramp that up to mega cities, it can seem people only pay attention to the bad news. Also consider that this entire statement is false. We hear good news all the time. I generally consider much on HN to be good, like this story. I see good things even on regular cable news. We have to be careful to see if we set up our own filters unintentionally. If all you think you hear is doom, go out of your way to find the good. You might. E surprised what you find.
- InclinedPlane 14y ago
  Doom tends to be fast and concentratedd. Goodness tends to be slow, steady, and diffuse.
- philwelch 14y ago
  Fear is a stronger motivator than hope. People are more motivated to inform themselves about threats than about positive things.
- jacoblyles 14y ago
  It's lame to be the guy who thinks the status quo is pretty good and that things are progressing nicely. It won't win you many friends at parties. Empirically, it's socially optimal to be the guy who insists we have to smash capitalism, or that the West is exploiting Africa and keeping it poor, or that if we don't cut our economic production by 20% in the next 10 years then nature will revolt and kill us all. Things like that sell.
lincolnq 14y ago
You can fund insecticide treated bed nets in developing countries by donating to Against Malaria Foundation (http://www.againstmalaria.com http://www.againstmalaria.com), which is currently estimated to be the #1 most impactful charity for your dollar in the world, as determined by GiveWell (http://givewell.org http://givewell.org).
- tomjen3 14y ago
  Honestly, why? As long as Africa has to live of what we want to give them, they will always suffer. If anything lend the money to make their own nets.
  - lusr 14y ago
    Are you honestly not aware that most of Africa was pillaged and plundered for centuries by European powers that greatly benefited from African resources - human and physical? Yet you expect Africa should recover from centuries of oppression without any assistance? You really recommend lending money, part of which, in the big scheme of things, was indirectly sourced from pillaging Africa? Judging from your profile you are Danish. If so, you have benefited from the colonisation of Africa by your ancestors (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danish_Gold_Coast http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danish_Gold_Coast). (Don't mistake me for a reparations supporter, but I do believe it's absurd to believe that "Africa" is where it is through its own actions and should therefore be solely responsible for growth and development.)
    - jkn 14y ago
      It's one thing to say Africa is responsible for its plight (OP didn't say that), it's another to say they're stuck in a vicious cycle of dependency on northern help that we should not feed. Not sure that applies to bed nets though...
    - tomjen3 14y ago
      I have benefitted from african colonisation in that I get access to tea, coffee and chocolade. If you are thinking about the slave trade (and when people talk about Africa a lot are) just remember that the europeans brought the slaves from other, stronger, tribes: meaning Africa was itself as responsible as was my ancestors. Except it is of course complete bullshit. A continent cannot have any guilt, nor can should I be guilty for what my ancestors have done. The only people responsible are the people involved. A man cannot be guilty because of the blood in his veins. As for how much Africa was hurt take a look at present day Zimbabwe -- it is a completely failed state. Back when the evil white farmers were occupying it, it was a net producer of food and the breadbasket of Africa.
learc83 14y ago
Fantastic news. I wonder how much of this is a result of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's war on malaria?
- chernevik 14y ago
  It would be very hard to tell. The earliest and biggest public health improvements are driven by simple but powerful measures: increased calorie counts, clean water, improved sanitation. Only once these are satisficed do things like health care and immunizations begin to matter at the margin. Something like malaria nets sounds cheap and simple enough to be a plausible driver. But even then, to a malnourished kid the nutrition probably matters first. Even extensive efforts, occurring amid improvements on the fundamentals, would probably be lost in the noise.
rokhayakebe 14y ago
I think education and the internet also have lots to do with this decline. People in the third world have seen a huge increase in internet adoption, which facilitates second hand learning; they are now more aware and educated and can take better preventive actions. Great news.
kevinpet 14y ago
I hate these government-accounting style stories. The numbers reported in the graph are the percent change in infant mortality relative to the rate of change to meet MDG. Is it just me, or would it be more useful to illustrate an article about infant mortality rates by a graph of the actual numbers for infant mortality in these countries?
kristoffer 14y ago
I wonder how this will affect Africa as a continent. The article doesn't mention possible effects this could have on these nations, such an analysis would be interesting to read.
carleverett 14y ago
This backs up Hans Rosling's talk on "The best statistics you've ever seen" pretty well: http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_shows_the_best_stats_you_ve_ever_seen.html http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_shows_the_best_stats_y... The world is definitely improving - from a health perspective. Of course you could talk about overpopulation as a chronic global problem as well, but in my opinion education on birth control will improve enough over the next few decades to help combat that.
- tomjen3 14y ago
  My greatest problem with that talk is that he gloss completely over the countries that haven't improved (in particular Congo/Zaire) and never will.
redwood 14y ago
The flip-side to reduced infant mortality is typically a population boom (at least this was the case in the 50s and 60s). I'm living in Bangladesh right now where the country really suffers due to over-crowding born out of that era which means there's not enough agricultural land to work for most people, leaving most people under-employed and impoverished. Of course reduction in infant mortality is good, but it can be coupled with problems later if family planning is not also brought into families at the exact same time. If family planning is delayed by one generation compared with the reduction in infant mortality, a country's population can rise exponentially very quickly which is highly destabilizing. The Vatican and others stand in the way to realizing family planning everywhere...
- dereg 14y ago
  I think you're mixing up the causal relationship between infant mortality, population growth, and economic growth. High population growth does not necessitate low economic growth. In fact, it's economic growth that tends to determine the rate of population growth, not the other way around.
  - yaix 14y ago
    The other way around as well. High population growth causes slow economic growth /per capita/ (because the available income is distributed among more people). In the book "Poor Economics" the authors show how poor parents tent to invest most resources they have in only child's education. All the other children get much less education and therefore only low paying jobs, thus remain poor. Less population growth would have a direct positive economic effect on the society's average level of education. High population growth is also very expensive in terms of public services, you need to build more schools, hospitals, police, etc. All that investment in /quantity/ prevents you from investing it in /quality/.
  - redwood 14y ago
    Are you talking about per capita economic growth? Anyway once a non-industrialized population reaches a population saturation point such that more people cannot create more agricultural produce (like here in Bangladesh) there's a squeeze on per capita economic output of the country. Sure the extra labor can now be used to industrialize, in theory. But the problem is without capital to industrialize with (as is the case here) a cycle of poverty can form which gets worse.
iRobot 14y ago
Step One achieved. Now if you could just feed and educate the little fellows and keep them from having too many kids and stop their (generally) useless and corrupt governments from destroying their countries and killing each other, the world would truly be a nicer place.

79 points by ph0rque 14y ago

Stories like this often don't get traction because it doesn't play into the news narrative. Doom sells. EDIT: Why is that? Why does doom sell?

geuis 14y ago
People are gossip machines. We innately talk to each other, about each other. It's one thing that has led us to develop culture. Or it might be because of culture. Anyway, people spread good news: Good harvest!, job promotion, new baby! But we also spread rumors, true or not. When you combine small village communication, then ramp that up to mega cities, it can seem people only pay attention to the bad news. Also consider that this entire statement is false. We hear good news all the time. I generally consider much on HN to be good, like this story. I see good things even on regular cable news. We have to be careful to see if we set up our own filters unintentionally. If all you think you hear is doom, go out of your way to find the good. You might. E surprised what you find.
InclinedPlane 14y ago
Doom tends to be fast and concentratedd. Goodness tends to be slow, steady, and diffuse.
philwelch 14y ago
Fear is a stronger motivator than hope. People are more motivated to inform themselves about threats than about positive things.
jacoblyles 14y ago
It's lame to be the guy who thinks the status quo is pretty good and that things are progressing nicely. It won't win you many friends at parties. Empirically, it's socially optimal to be the guy who insists we have to smash capitalism, or that the West is exploiting Africa and keeping it poor, or that if we don't cut our economic production by 20% in the next 10 years then nature will revolt and kill us all. Things like that sell.

lincolnq 14y ago

You can fund insecticide treated bed nets in developing countries by donating to Against Malaria Foundation (http://www.againstmalaria.com http://www.againstmalaria.com), which is currently estimated to be the #1 most impactful charity for your dollar in the world, as determined by GiveWell (http://givewell.org http://givewell.org).

tomjen3 14y ago
Honestly, why? As long as Africa has to live of what we want to give them, they will always suffer. If anything lend the money to make their own nets.
- lusr 14y ago
  Are you honestly not aware that most of Africa was pillaged and plundered for centuries by European powers that greatly benefited from African resources - human and physical? Yet you expect Africa should recover from centuries of oppression without any assistance? You really recommend lending money, part of which, in the big scheme of things, was indirectly sourced from pillaging Africa? Judging from your profile you are Danish. If so, you have benefited from the colonisation of Africa by your ancestors (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danish_Gold_Coast http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danish_Gold_Coast). (Don't mistake me for a reparations supporter, but I do believe it's absurd to believe that "Africa" is where it is through its own actions and should therefore be solely responsible for growth and development.)
  - jkn 14y ago
    It's one thing to say Africa is responsible for its plight (OP didn't say that), it's another to say they're stuck in a vicious cycle of dependency on northern help that we should not feed. Not sure that applies to bed nets though...
  - tomjen3 14y ago
    I have benefitted from african colonisation in that I get access to tea, coffee and chocolade. If you are thinking about the slave trade (and when people talk about Africa a lot are) just remember that the europeans brought the slaves from other, stronger, tribes: meaning Africa was itself as responsible as was my ancestors. Except it is of course complete bullshit. A continent cannot have any guilt, nor can should I be guilty for what my ancestors have done. The only people responsible are the people involved. A man cannot be guilty because of the blood in his veins. As for how much Africa was hurt take a look at present day Zimbabwe -- it is a completely failed state. Back when the evil white farmers were occupying it, it was a net producer of food and the breadbasket of Africa.

learc83 14y ago

Fantastic news. I wonder how much of this is a result of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's war on malaria?

chernevik 14y ago
It would be very hard to tell. The earliest and biggest public health improvements are driven by simple but powerful measures: increased calorie counts, clean water, improved sanitation. Only once these are satisficed do things like health care and immunizations begin to matter at the margin. Something like malaria nets sounds cheap and simple enough to be a plausible driver. But even then, to a malnourished kid the nutrition probably matters first. Even extensive efforts, occurring amid improvements on the fundamentals, would probably be lost in the noise.

rokhayakebe 14y ago

I think education and the internet also have lots to do with this decline. People in the third world have seen a huge increase in internet adoption, which facilitates second hand learning; they are now more aware and educated and can take better preventive actions. Great news.

kevinpet 14y ago

I hate these government-accounting style stories. The numbers reported in the graph are the percent change in infant mortality relative to the rate of change to meet MDG. Is it just me, or would it be more useful to illustrate an article about infant mortality rates by a graph of the actual numbers for infant mortality in these countries?

kristoffer 14y ago

I wonder how this will affect Africa as a continent. The article doesn't mention possible effects this could have on these nations, such an analysis would be interesting to read.

carleverett 14y ago

This backs up Hans Rosling's talk on "The best statistics you've ever seen" pretty well: http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_shows_the_best_stats_you_ve_ever_seen.html http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_shows_the_best_stats_y... The world is definitely improving - from a health perspective. Of course you could talk about overpopulation as a chronic global problem as well, but in my opinion education on birth control will improve enough over the next few decades to help combat that.

tomjen3 14y ago
My greatest problem with that talk is that he gloss completely over the countries that haven't improved (in particular Congo/Zaire) and never will.

redwood 14y ago

The flip-side to reduced infant mortality is typically a population boom (at least this was the case in the 50s and 60s). I'm living in Bangladesh right now where the country really suffers due to over-crowding born out of that era which means there's not enough agricultural land to work for most people, leaving most people under-employed and impoverished. Of course reduction in infant mortality is good, but it can be coupled with problems later if family planning is not also brought into families at the exact same time. If family planning is delayed by one generation compared with the reduction in infant mortality, a country's population can rise exponentially very quickly which is highly destabilizing. The Vatican and others stand in the way to realizing family planning everywhere...

dereg 14y ago
I think you're mixing up the causal relationship between infant mortality, population growth, and economic growth. High population growth does not necessitate low economic growth. In fact, it's economic growth that tends to determine the rate of population growth, not the other way around.
- yaix 14y ago
  The other way around as well. High population growth causes slow economic growth /per capita/ (because the available income is distributed among more people). In the book "Poor Economics" the authors show how poor parents tent to invest most resources they have in only child's education. All the other children get much less education and therefore only low paying jobs, thus remain poor. Less population growth would have a direct positive economic effect on the society's average level of education. High population growth is also very expensive in terms of public services, you need to build more schools, hospitals, police, etc. All that investment in /quantity/ prevents you from investing it in /quality/.
- redwood 14y ago
  Are you talking about per capita economic growth? Anyway once a non-industrialized population reaches a population saturation point such that more people cannot create more agricultural produce (like here in Bangladesh) there's a squeeze on per capita economic output of the country. Sure the extra labor can now be used to industrialize, in theory. But the problem is without capital to industrialize with (as is the case here) a cycle of poverty can form which gets worse.

iRobot 14y ago

Step One achieved. Now if you could just feed and educate the little fellows and keep them from having too many kids and stop their (generally) useless and corrupt governments from destroying their countries and killing each other, the world would truly be a nicer place.