According to CNN Health:

Since then, the Cleveland Clinic has seen a 50 percent increase in vasectomies, an outpatient surgery that is the cheapest form of permanent birth control. Vasectomies are less invasive and cheaper than tubal ligation, which involves blocking, tieing or cutting a woman’s fallopian tubes to prevent pregnancy.

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Feel your blood pressure rising?  You’re not alone.  There may be no political issue that generates more controversy than abortion.  Some recent polls indicate that almost half of voters say it is a top issue influencing their vote one way or another.

Lost in the shuffle of whether life begins at conception or at birth is the broader implications of family planning on the one issue that most affects sustainable development:  population.

It may surprise some that Prescott Bush, grandfather of George W. Bush, was Treasurer of Planned Parenthood in 1947.  Grandfather Bush supported Planned Parenthood and women’s reproductive rights, as did Father Bush, until given an ultimatum in 1980 by then candidate Reagan. Why exactly the switch came is the subject of much debate.

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In a controversial statement, leading environmental campaigner Jonathon Porritt has said that couples who have more than two children are being ‘irresponsible’ by creating an unbearable burden on the environment.

Porritt, Chair of the UK’s high-level Sustainable Development Commission, has urged world government’s to consider adopting widespread contraception and abortion policies as a vital component of strategies to reduce global warming.

Speaking about his views, which are sure to raise an eyebrow or two amongst liberal thinkers, Porritt said, “I am unapologetic about asking people to connect up their own responsibility for their total environmental footprint and how they decide to procreate and how many children they think are appropriate.”

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Some 43 countries around the world now have populations that are either essentially stable or declining slowly. In countries with the lowest fertility rates, including Japan, Russia, Germany, and Italy, populations will likely decline somewhat over the next half-century. A larger group of countries has reduced fertility to the replacement level or just below.

They are headed for population stability after large numbers of young people move through their reproductive years. Included in this group are China and the United States. A third group of countries is projected to more than double their populations by 2050, including Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Uganda.

United Nations projections show world population growth under three different assumptions about fertility levels. The medium projection, the one most commonly used, has world population reaching 9.2 billion by 2050. The high one reaches 10.8 billion. The low projection, which assumes that the world will quickly move below replacement-level fertility to 1.6 children per couple, has population peaking at just under 8 billion in 2041 and then declining. If the goal is to eradicate poverty, hunger, and illiteracy, and lessen pressures on already strained natural resources, we have little choice but to strive for the lower projection.

Slowing world population growth means that all women who want to plan their families should have access to the family planning services they need. Unfortunately, at present 201 million couples cannot obtain the services they need. Former U.S. Agency for International Development official J. Joseph Speidel notes that “if you ask anthropologists who live and work with poor people at the village level…they often say that women live in fear of their next pregnancy. They just do not want to get pregnant.” Filling the family planning gap may be the most urgent item on the global agenda. The benefits are enormous and the costs are minimal.

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There are valid considerations when one is deciding to have children (and how many children to have) like religion and your capacity to care for children. Among these issues should not be the “save the earth, don’t breed” mentality. IMO, this mentality places a greater emphasis on animal rights and earth over HUMAN LIFE and Family. Something is just wrong with that priority assignment.

We all must work toward environmental protection. We must reduce our footprint on this earth and we must raise children who are aware and carry on in earth saving efforts.

This is why I believe that we should be the people raising MORE CHILDREN. By the very nature of parenting, I am raising children who are conscious of the impact of everything they do on the earth. They CARE about conservation and reducing consumption. They are experts on recycling and reducing energy consumption. They live and value natural, organic and local food consumption. These children will grow up to be tomorrows adults who will be making policy that will promote ENVIRONMENTALISM.

If those of us who care strongly about our environment do not raise children then who will raise warriors of this earth?

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Examining linkages between population and climate change through many different frames leads to important research and policy questions — and it also allows the reproductive health community to discuss these linkages in a productive and positive way. If we leave the debate unframed, and the research questions unanswered, we leave space for harmful discourse and inaccurate facts to take center stage. The following series of blog posts, written by staff at Population Action International, will look at population and climate change from different angles, and provide an initial review of some of the broad frames.

Dr. Karen Hardee raises many of the difficult ethical issues that arise when population and climate change are linked. She examines these linkages from a women’s rights and empowerment frame. She encourages people, both those comfortable and uncomfortable with the linkage between population and climate change, to discuss the issue in order to come up with the best solutions and avoid mistakes of the past.

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Today, July 11th, is World Population Day, a day set aside to increase awareness about global population issues and the strain it creates on the environment. In a time when it seems like there is a day set aside for every issue that requires more than one day of action and awareness, World Population Day will not be celebrated with gifts, cards, and flowers. This year, men's role in family planning is the focus.

World Population Day was established by the United Nations Development Program on the day in 1989 when the Earth's human population reached five billion people. Almost 20 years later, we have reached over 6.6 billion humans on this fragile planet with approximately 77 million people added each year. The question that must be asked is when will we no longer be able to support the our global population or have we already reached this point?

Info for Health's Population Report sums up the issue well:

As the century begins, natural resources are under increasing pressure, threatening public health and development. Water shortages, soil exhaustion, loss of forests, air and water pollution, and degradation of coastlines afflict many areas. As the world's population grows, improving living standards without destroying the environment is a global challenge.

Most developed economies currently consume resources much faster than they can regenerate. Most developing countries with rapid population growth face the urgent need to improve living standards. As we humans exploit nature to meet present needs, are we destroying resources needed for the future?

There are so many issues involving global population growth and the controversy surrounding it. Public health, food supply, freshwater, coastlines and oceans, biodiversity, and global climate change are all affected by our increasing population. We may not feel the effects in the United States directly yet, but if we look to developing countries and the natural resources available, it is easy to become alarmed. Of course, there are those people who deny this is a problem and feel human ingenuity will sovle any issue that arises.

If we want to insure a livable future, we must increase our sustainabilty practices, as well as stabilize the human population on Earth. With 1 billion people being added to the planet every 13 years, we must slow this growth to enable us to address sustainability issues and preserve a higher standard of living for all people. Voluntary family planning in all countries should be supported, including eliminating the Global Gag Rule. Even though the United States population grows mostly due to immigration, there are still large families in this country with eight or nine children. However, 99% of the population growth does occurs in developing countries, where two in three people lack clean drinking water. Family planning education that targets both men and women, as well as aid should be a priority as we look to stabilize population growth. As the Sierra Club states, "When women and men can choose the size and spacing of their families, they tend to have smaller, healthier families. This has a ripple effect that benefits communities socially, economically, and environmentally."