When lives become cheap

As prognosticated by several prescient writers since H G Wells, some human lives on an over-crowded globe become so cheap as to be nearly worthless.

Criminal charges should be laid against the author of the “stay inside your burning building” advice. All international fire research concludes that the instantaneous reaction needs to be “run”, because you have only seconds to escape.

Combustible cladding is further concrete confirmation that there are now people in authority who give little priority to population survival. Our minds instinctively make decisions according to subconscious fears and prejudices, in this case probably fear of over-population — casualties reduce the big problem.

Astute politicians pay lip-service to caring about the down-trodden but the inconvenient truth is that there are far too many to deal with.