A recap of the world goneby!
It is the year 1946 and your country has just begun to dip its toes in the field of development, but not for the sake of destruction but the sake of healing. The greatest war ever had just ended and the scars are still fresh. The average life expectancy of a new-born in your nation is just around 40, and the government has made some changes to the health policy.
You would be getting vaccinated against a whole range of diseases that have plagued humanity for upwards of a millennium. You and your family wait for your turn and then head to the hospital when the time comes.
This is basically what living in the late 1940s and ’50s was all about. And yet, with significant progress and never-ending determination, humanity has basically doubled the average life expectancy of a baby born 75 years later. The average life expectancy in the year 1950 was just 45 years. In India, it was even worse in the 30s. Now it is a whopping 72! Way to go smart humans, you have redeemed yourselves.
Another indicator of increasing life quality is the number of children each woman bears over the course of her life. Seven decades ago, this number lingered around 3–4 in the most prosperous regions, and at a horrifying 6–8 in the most backward regions. However, the numbers have halved with the average fertility rate at 2.4 children per woman. Sure, there are outliers like Niger and Somalia with the number above 6 in both countries, but the general trend is nothing short of positive.
A good place to compare data is the union health budget of any country. As early as the 1880s, the advanced nations of Europe didn’t even have a concept of a health budget. You would be lucky to live in a country where they spent over 0.3% of their overall money on health. Now, we have countries like Sweden that spend a tenth of their budget on public health. Most developed countries spend at least 5% of their money on health. This has made sure that the above two points: life expectancy and fertility rate have improved.
This has also meant a lot more things like general wellbeing, care of the elderly. General things like education and infrastructure have improved. A healthy society can do leaps and wonders. What have the next 70 years got in store for us? Definitely positive things!
The past year has shown us that these numbers mean real things and that if a pandemic like this occurred sometimes earlier, we would have been screwed severely. It is thanks to the visionary leaders of the world and their ideas for a better humanity, that we have been able to combat the crisis. Sure, the pandemic has been tough, but we have been tougher.
