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Have Fewer Kids To Save Planet?

BMJ Says Fewer Births Helps Cut Carbon

POSTED: 6:58 am PDT September 25, 2008

Having fewer children helps cut your carbon footprint, according to an editorial from the British Medical Journal.

SURVEY: Kids' Impact On The Environment?

The publication said that people should have no more than two children if they want to slow global climate change and lower carbon emissions.

The Chicago Tribune noted that it was odd to have the call come from Europe, where many nations already face falling birth rates. But each child born in a rich country like Britain or the United States is likely to be responsible for 160 times as much carbon emitted as a child born in Ethiopia, said John Guillebaud, one of the authors of the editorial.

The world's population, now at 6.7 billion, is expected to reach about 9 billion by 2050.

Some say a population that large will be too much for the world to handle.

Experts cited by the Tribune said the best ways to cut the world's birthrate are education, birth-control options and better health care.

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