The Seven Billionth Baby Circus

a) It is not true  b) If it is to highlight overpopulation, why is everyone cheering?

The city of boise in the United States of America was witness to an astonishing coincidence at 1.18 am last Monday when the seven billionth baby was born there to a mother of Chinese descent and an American father. Twelve years ago, in that same city, the sixth billion baby was also born. What are the odds of two such rare births happening at one city? One hundred per cent.

The first thing to know about the seven billionth baby is that it is not the seven billionth baby. Not in Boise, not in Dauraha village in Uttar Pradesh, where Nargis arrived with fanfare, not in a hospital in Manila in the Philippines, where the media waited for Danica May Camacho to cry out into the world. The seven billionth baby is anyone’s for the making, so long as there is good public relations groundwork done before the birth.

The present flurry is the result of the United Nations announcing that the seven billionth baby would be born on 31 October. Even they don’t believe in it. This is from the United Nations website relating to the seven billion number: ‘…it is very likely that we have uncertainty in total population estimates of at least 1 per cent at the global level. If we assume an error margin of only 1 per cent at the global level the 7 billion world population could be reached 6 months earlier or later.’ In other words, the baby could have been born anytime anywhere between May 2011 and April 2012.

There is also another curious element in the circus—the reason for the United Nations to announce this as a symbolic date was to create awareness about the issue of overpopulation.  Being the symbol of a depressing reality, the seven billionth baby should, therefore, have been greeted with self-reproach, contrition and guilt. Instead, the general mood has been one of achievement at having managed to produce so many and having got the right one to drop off at your local address.

India’s own Nargis is the creation of an NGO astute enough to know how a symbol like the seven billionth can be used. It might be a noble cause (in this case, to highlight female foeticide), but it doesn’t change the fact that it is based on misrepresentation. The truth is deliberately fine-printed in the cheer, and that’s not a good way to go about doing anything.

About The Author

Madhavankutty Pillai

Madhavankutty Pillai has no specialisations whatsoever. He is among the last of the generalists. And also Open chief of bureau, Mumbai  

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