The Other One Percent
Over the past few decades, humanity has gotten a lot better at keeping very young and very poor children from dying. “The number of [childhood] deaths expected in 2025—about 4.8 million—is less than half of the 11.6 million reported in 1990.” I don’t have expertise in either childhood health or the complex math of global economics, but those numbers seem to make one thing pretty clear: We should do more of whatever we we’ve been doing since 1990. The richest countries in the world have been able to save millions and millions of lives for what is essentially a rounding error on their annual GDP spreadsheets. It’s not only economically sensical, it’s also the decent thing to do as human beings. In other words, child-saving foreign aid is precisely the kind of program that the Trump administration would cut. And with the help of the chainsaw-wielding DOGE taskmaskers, backed by the world’s richest man, cutting USAID funds was one of the first things the new administration did. For whatever reason, foreign aid is not one of the hot button political issues that gets voters to the polls. People tend to think we spend a lot more on such aid than we actually do. “Opinion polls consistently report that Americans believe foreign aid is in the range of 25 percent of the federal budget. When asked how much it should be, they say about 10 percent.” The real number is closer to one percent. So maybe it’s a misinformation problem. Or maybe providing food and medicine for starving and sickly babies is just viewed as being too woke. Whatever the reason, there’s a relatively small political price to be paid for these cuts. But the human cost is dramatic. WSJ (Gift Article): For First Time in Decades, Child Deaths Will Rise This Year. “Almost a quarter of a million more children are projected to die in 2025 than in 2024 … Driving the shift, Bill Gates said, is a 27% decline in global health aid from donors in wealthy countries, including the U.S. and some European governments. Such aid pays for medicine, health clinics and workers, food and other needs for children in poor countries. The reductions include the Trump administration’s cutting and reorganizing of the U.S. Agency for International Development. ‘I believe that was a gigantic mistake, and that’s partly why we’ve had the turmoil and increase in deaths this year.'”
+ “The US has dismantled initiatives to tackle diseases such as HIV and malaria, while other countries, including Germany and the UK, have also cut spending. Growing vaccine skepticism has also hit immunization rates, leading to a rise in deadly childhood illnesses.” Childhood deaths to rise for first time this millennium. This turn of events should be a teachable moment for American voters. But it might just end up being a tough lesson for the kids waiting on aid.
