Good News for the World's People

Hey, doomsayers, next time you think everything is getting worse in our world, remember these facts about the worldwide population:

• Infant mortality decreased by more than half between 1990 and 2010.
• 43 percent of people lived to at least the age of 70 in 2010, up from 33 percent in 1990. That's a 30 percent increase.
• The average age of death in Brazil and Paraguay increased from just 30 to 63 between 1970 and 2010.

Everyone has to die of something, of course, but I think it's an excellent goal to get to a point where premature death from disease is a thing of the past. Having a population where almost everyone reaches an advanced age has its own problems, of course, but it's preferable to the loss of people long before their time.