Human population is a problem. There are nearly 8 billion people on this planet, well above the carrying capacity. 1 billion is possibly above the actual carrying capacity, but I'll go with that number as the potential or realistic number.
And yes, this virus is not going to kill a significant number of humankind. Yes, I'm honestly okay with some of my loved ones dying from this. And yes, I have already lost several loved ones to this virus.
Perhaps I'm more realistic than some.
I just spent some time trying to find life expectancy and the 1918 flu epidemic, and couldn't find what I'd found in the past. Which was that as terrible as that epidemic was, it impacted life expectancy for no more than two years. Meaning life expectancy dropped noticeably from 1918 to 1920, and then bounced back up to what it had been. Interesting. And that was with a far more devastating world wide pandemic.
Right now, life expectancy is hardly impacted. I'm sure that's mainly because an awful lot of those dying are older.
And yeah, we need something that will drastically reduce human population but not wipe it out altogether. You've got that absolutely right. This is something I've been thinking about for nearly 50 years now. That there are already far too many people on this planet, that we collectively make a lot of things worse (and yes, I'm complicit in this), and this needs to be addressed and changed.
Unfortunately, how our world proceeds is dependent on growth. More people, more jobs, more industry, more farm produce, and on and on. Our world has almost never experienced a true contraction of people, jobs, or anything. The Black Plague in the middle of the 14th century in Europe was pretty much the only exception. That resulted in at least 50% of people in certain specific places dying. In some places less, in some places more. One interesting outcome was that ordinary workers, now desperately needed for ordinary tasks (like plowing fields) were in high demand and could finally ask for better wages. The change in European culture was profound.
But that was predicated on half or more of everyone dying.
Even the worst scenarios for Covid-19 are in the range of single digits.
Meanwhile, there are far too many people on this planet. And it's only getting worse.
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