I am encouraged to present this balance, full of figures that give us reliable signs of how the world and its inhabitants are progressing, the conviction that assists me that the scenarios that I will describe from this paragraph are of interest or, in any case, of useful for readers who follow my chronicles. It is a series of diagnoses that reveal to us how the existence of millions of beings on planet Earth takes place.
We begin by presenting a striking paradox by noting that, while artificial intelligence advances with its arsenal of innovations in the field of science and technology, there are millions of women and men who have not yet been able to learn to read or write. . Of course, it is fair to point out that, since the computer scientist John McCarthy, in 1956, came up with the idea of showing the route of that revolutionary trend known as “the science and ingenuity of making intelligent machines, especially intelligent computer programs”, there have been millions of of human beings who have been able to get out of that dark alley that represents illiteracy. Unfortunately, across the globe, there are still 773 million adults who do not have basic literacy skills, according to UNESCO data. (1).
This is an unjustifiable limitation in this era in which there are machines that think like humans, we see a robot that acts rationally as if they were a being of flesh and blood and in contrast adults who do not even know how to scribble their personal data. That is a wide path, or rather a gigantic ambush for millions of human beings to be trapped in the nets of poverty, a situation from which a significant number of people living in the extreme poverty with less than USD 2.15 a day. This positive trend has been reversed since the pandemic triggered by COVID-19 appeared, a fact that has been detected by the technicians who work for the World Bank, when verifying the alterations that relaunched the increase in poverty rates in which millions survive. of people, as a consequence of that pandemic, the war in Ukraine, inflation and economic depression. According to research carried out by the World Bank “between 75 and 95 million people were pushed to live in extreme poverty in the period of last year 2022.”
These same investigations outline that, “almost certainly, the effects of the current crises will be felt in most countries until 2030. Under these conditions, the objective of reducing the absolute global poverty rate to less than 3% for 2030—already compromised before the pandemic—is now unattainable unless countries quickly take major and meaningful policy steps.”(2).
Along with poverty, it seems that the phenomenon of insecurity would be condemned to be its partner. Let’s see which names of countries appear in the notebook in which the accounts of those responsible for the highest rate of intentional homicides (unlawful death intentionally inflicted on a person by another person) are recorded, published by the UNODC (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime) shows that the regions with the most murders on the planet are Central and South America.
According to this investigation carried out by the UNODC, “the country with the highest homicide rate in the world is Honduras, with 91.6 annual murders per 100,000 inhabitants. Then come El Salvador (69.2), Ivory Coast (56.9), Venezuela (45.1), Belize (41.4) and Jamaica (40.9)”. The conclusions of said report show that “these data may vary given that the legal definition of ‘intentional homicide’ differs between countries (it may or may not include infanticide, assisted suicide or euthanasia). There may also be false reports for political reasons.”
Other consequences that the pandemic has caused are “social isolation, financial difficulties and interruption of health services”, causing a series of disorders that put the mental health of many people at risk. These are data that I read in the report of the World Health Organization (WHO) carried out in March 2022 (A WHO report). From this research it was possible to conclude that “the global prevalence of anxiety and depression increased by 25%” (3).
Continuing with the data referring to health, the true fact that “in 2020, at least 23 million children did not receive basic childhood vaccines through systematic health services, is the highest figure since 2009, and 3.7 million more than in 2019”. These are figures provided by technicians who work for UNICEF and for the WHO, in whose reports released on April 27, 2022, they warn that “the increase in measles cases in January and February 2022 reveals that there is a greater risk of increasing the spread of diseases that can be prevented by vaccination and could trigger an increase in epidemic outbreaks, especially due to measles” (4).
Malaria is another disease that threatens the health of humanity. “In 2021, the 17 countries and one territory of the Region of the Americas with endemic malaria accounted for 0.2% of the world’s malaria cases. Three countries in the region—Brazil, Colombia, and Venezuela—accounted for approximately 79% of all cases in the region. In recent years, the regional trend of cases has been greatly affected by the malaria epidemic in Venezuela, where cases increased from 35,500 in the year 2,000 to more than 482,000 in 2017.” (5).
Finally, a fact that is powerfully striking: currently, more than 2,100 million people do not enjoy drinking water service. These are figures provided in a World Bank report. Another 2,300 million human beings survive in areas that do not have the most basic sanitation standards.
I could go on with figures on other events such as global warming, the amount of energy reserves we have left in the world, the hectares of criminally deforested forests, or on the life expectancy of people today. But other installments will come to address these and many other issues. Meanwhile, it is urgent to find solutions to overcome these deficiencies, and it must be done as soon as possible and with the help of all.
@AlcaldeLedezma
- https://amp.antena3.com/noticias/cultura/estas-son-cifras-actuales-analfabetismo-espana-mundo-2022_202209086319734460c19f00018eeb4b.html
- (https://www.bancomundial.org/es/topic/poverty/overview)
- https://www.bancomundial.org/es/topic/health/overview
- https://www.unicef.org/es/comunicados-prensa/unicef-y-oms-advierten-condiciones-aumenten-brotes-sarampion
- https://cdn.who.int/media/docs/default-source/malaria/world-malaria-reports/wmr2022-regional-briefing-kit-spa.pdf?sfvrsn=7cb400ed_6&download=true
