Posted on: Wednesday, July 24, 2002

EDITORIAL
Bush defies logic, pulls family planning money

China has long practiced sometimes brutal and draconian forms of birth control that include forced sterilization and late-term abortions.

Given China's exploding population, however, it seems clear that some forms of population control are preferable to the starvation that otherwise would result.

Indeed, China presents the perfect opportunity for the introduction and demonstration of more advanced and humanitarian family planning practices. To the extent that these alternatives are adopted, the harsher forms are avoided.

So the Bush administration's decision to withhold $34 million that had been earmarked for United Nations family planning programs overseas has everything to do with domestic politics in the coming political season and little to do with logic.

Or the facts: A study team sent to China by the Bush administration recommended that the U.N. funding go forward.

Not only in China but worldwide, cutting off this U.N. funding will increase the number of abortions or other medical problems by depriving women of the education and help they need and that U.N. programs provide. The United States should increase its support instead of ending it.