Just after midnight the stork flapped into the Philippines bearing Danica May Camacho, officially declared by the United Nations as the 7 billionth earthling. After the delirious jollity accompanying the newborn's arrival wore off, church bells that had started clanging to celebrate the announcement continued to peal. Could one detect a streak of despair in those strains?
Bluntly put, little Danica had set off the alarm.
On this overcrowded ark, that day-old Filipina is one more claimant to our meager resources. One more carbon footprint, albeit infant-sized, to hasten the juggernaut of climate change. One more mouth and belly to stake claim to precious — and increasingly scarce — stores of food and water. To chip away at diminishing fossil fuel reserves. To demand the denuding of another square kilometer of forest cover to sustain her burgeoning urban terrarium, the biodiversity of which is rapidly diminishing.
