September 17th, 2011
Tanzania: Fast drop in child mortality!
UN just published estimates for child mortality in all countries in 2010! http://www.unicef.org/media/files/Child_Mortality_Report_2011_Final.pdf
It is a well documented compilation that brings much good news! Child mortality counted as deaths < 5 years per 1000 born has dropped in Tanzania that had:
1995: 155 deaths per 1000 born (Sweden had this rate 1896)
2010: 76 Read more …
May 27th, 2011
Datasets are not books
Some international organisations keep selling public datasets as if they were books. This bad habit is a relic from the time when copying data was expensive. OECD still have a list of public datasets for sale. One item is especially absurd to keep selling. It’s the International Trade by Commodity Statistics Database, available Read more …
May 23rd, 2011
Selling sex without HIV in Pakistan
People ask me: DO you believe UNAIDS data saying that less than 0.1 % of adults in Pakistan are HIV infected? YES I DO, the estimate is not based on reporting but on surveys. The uncertainty is wide, yet all surveys indicate that only a fraction of one percent of adults live with HIV in Read more …
May 22nd, 2011
CUBA – poorest of the healthy
A decade ago I lectured to the staff of the Ministry of Health in Cuba. After my talk the Minister happily said, this graphs showed that Cuba is the healthiest of the poor countries! On the way out a young staff member whispered in my ear:
- He is wrong, Cuba is just the poorest of the healthy countries.
Gapminder World Read more …
May 21st, 2011
IRELAND REMAINS AHEAD OF UK!
Look at the great catch up of Ireland since the terrible famine in 1849. That year the lifespan in Ireland, 20 years, was estimated to half of that in UK! And the estimated income per person in Ireland was only 1/3 of that in UK.
But Ireland has cached up and overtaken the former colonial ruler in both income and health. Read more …
May 20th, 2011
Big oil reserves + Democracy = False
The five countries with the highest oil reserves per person are UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia & Libya. All five score very low, from -7 to -10, in democracy (the scores run from +10 to -10)! Of these five countries Libya has the lowest amounts of oil reserves per person; and therefore perhaps the highest chance for democracy? www.bit.ly/iLTom2
Hans Read more …
May 15th, 2011
Barbados – Haiti: 15 -1
Michel Martelly was sworn in Saturday as the new president of Haiti. He face a relay tough task!
Since 1950 GDP/capita has not grown at all, it remains around 1 thousand dollar per person in Haiti. In spite of this Life expectancy has increased from 36 to 61 years. So with money sent home from relatives in US and Read more …
May 15th, 2011
Azerbaijan, better than ever!
Azerbaijan not only won the European Song Contest 2011, it also has among the highest oil and natural gas production per person in the world www.bit.ly/iNksgW
Not only has the income per person steadily imporved since 1995, but so has also the mean number of years in school for women and Azerbadjan has today higher GDP/ Read more …
