Having a smaller family is the only sustainable option

Explosive population growth over the past half-century has been a critical driver of the climate crisis, as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states: “GDP per capita and population growth remained the two strongest drivers of CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion in the last decade.”

Already, we use more of our planet’s natural resources than it can renew each year – 1.8 planet’s worth. This is only possible because some of us take more than our fair share – our ecological footprint in the UK makes us equivalent to a nation of 10-tonne King Kongs stomping about!

The UN projects our population will increase to 9.7 billion by 2050 – more people demanding, needing, and deserving more of our planet than it can sustainably provide.

An unfair, nasty future for many? It doesn’t have to be. People and planet-benefiting solutions are available and wanted: universal, quality education for girls, and choices over safe, modern family planning. Together, those would cut more carbon dioxide than from all onshore and offshore windpower – whilst also avoiding unwanted pregnancies, slowing population growth, liberating skills and speeding up sustainable development.

Next week, rather specifically on 15 November, according to the UN, our human population will top 8 billion – a billion more since 2011, double the 4 billion of us on Earth in 1974.

For a high-consuming country like the UK with access to education and family planning, choosing a smaller family is the single most effective eco-action to cool our planet and act as global citizens.

Robin Maynard Director of Population Matters

Abortion was Trump’s downfall...

There always was that tiny glimmer of hope that abortion rights would be Trump’s undoing. Galvanising women to go out and vote pushed the Democrats into a more favourable position (News, yesterday). When you try to turn the clock back and take away rights people believed to be unalienable, you enrage and engage them. In this case, to vote for those who will defend those rights.

Midterms are usually a wake-up call for the incumbent. Not this time. And the irony is, Trump doesn’t care about abortion. He just wanted those bigots’ votes. He chose the wrong side of the argument. Thank goodness.

Lynn Brymer Ashford, Kent

... and he is the Republican Party’s downfall

If the blame for the Republicans’ failed “red wave” gets pinned on Donald Trump’s toxic politics while the Democrats attribute their mid-term losses in Congress to Biden’s lacklustre presidency, the question for 2024 will be what will the two protagonists of America’s bitterest election contest two years ago do then?

Biden has already indicated he may seek a second term, making him 86 years old by the time he finishes – a problem when questions about his frailty and mental agility have already dogged his first term. Yet none of his obvious rivals, whether the radical “squad”, his vice president, Kamala Harris, or Washington outsiders like Beta O’Rourke have the same proven

electoral credentials to beat Trump by appealing to enough of middle and blue-collar America.

Trump poses a far greater problem to the Republican Party. If he is scapegoated for the poor performance and an attempt is made to dump him in favour of Florida’s Governor DeSantis, his enormous ego would almost surely compel him to run as an independent in 2024 sure of holding on to his adoring support base.

Under the electoral college system, it may not be sufficient to win the presidency but could be enough to wreck Republican chances, the precedent being 1912 when ex-president and exRepublican Teddy Roosevelt stood as an independent, splitting the Republican vote and letting the Democrats under Woodrow Wilson into the White House.

Paul Dolan Cheshire

Meta layoffs

With the announcement by Mark Zuckerberg (News, yesterday) that he will be laying off 11,000 employees (13 per cent of Meta’s worldwide workforce apparently), is this an admission that his current business model is virtually, pun-intended, unsustainable?

Does this also signal that, post-pandemic, more people have discovered that it is possible to have a mood-enhancing “heightened interactive and awareness experience” that also has a significantly lower carbon footprint, achieved by engaging and sharing in such activities as spending time in an inspirational natural environment, regular exercise, mindfulness and sustained sobriety?

Nigel Plevin Somerset

Health crisis

Thankfully, I am an infrequent user of our NHS. Most recently, I was fortunate to receive my flu and Covid jabs, thanks to the voluntary hours put in by all the staff at the session provided by my local GP practice. At every contact, I meet excellent staff who are efficient, kind and caring. It is criminal that our nurses need to take strike action to get a fair wage (News, yesterday).

I hope that now is the time when our government finds that £350m every week Boris Johnson promised would be invested in our NHS. Let’s hope the current leadership finds some common decency and works with the nurses and looks after them as well as they look after us.

Joan Cooper Abingdon, Oxfordshire

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