Heath concludes “our victories over famine and extreme poverty during the past two centuries are civilisation’s greatest achievement. It is time we took a well-deserved break from worrying about terrorism, rising crime, social dislocation and all our other problems to celebrate what we have actually got right.”
I suspect Heath is a great fan of George Orwell. Or suffers from head-in-sand-ism.
You wonder if Goklany and Heath are aware HIV-Aids infection rates increased by 2.6 million world-wide between 2004 and 2006, in all regions (according to The Guardian Weekly December 1-7, 2006), always closely linked to poverty. Three-quarters of HIV drugs are still under monopoly production and unaffordable in poor countries. Health workers don’t stay around and economies continue to worsen, giving rise to many other sicknesses.
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Competition is not only about money, of course. It also becomes a general social philosophy morphing into violence as expressed by politicians, affecting war and peace, win-at-any-cost sport, violence in pubs, even at private parties.
But that’s another story.
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