alt Hacker NewsThere will be an estimated 14 million extra deaths directly attributed to this policy choice: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...
91 million lives were saved over the last two decades. The vast majority of that wasn't "international development" fluff; it was basic survival. We’re talking about stopping tuberculosis, malaria, and starvation.
Framing this as getting rid of unwanted "cultural programs" is a convenient way to ignore the fact that we pulled the plug on the life support system for 30 million children.
Yes I'm sure that the regime and its cronies who have spent the past 50+ years fabricating evidence for illegal wars to enrich themselves and their friends in the military and energy industries, trafficking arms and sponsoring regime change, destabilizing and occupying Iraq and Afghanistan, destroying Syria and Libya, droning Africa and Pakistan, arming and funding terrorist "JV teams" like ISIS, all uniquely care so deeply about the welfare of "the poor brown people" that they just desperately wanted to give the very shirts from their backs to this noble cause, if only the horrible government had not just forbidden it. Sure, that is the most likely explanation for all this.
Come on now. These programs are rife with corruption and ulterior motives. People have moved on from "think of the starving children" being able to shut down any questioning of it.
And really that's just silly when you think about it. If that's supposed to be an argument then we might ask why did previous governments practically murder 100 million people by not spending even more money on all these wonderful programs? Why are the European countries that have funded this paper you linked to murdering these orphans right now by not stepping in to replace the lost funding? It's just not really the way to have a reasoned discussion about it.
Interesting introduction to the paper too:
> Evidence before this study
> Despite the US Agency for International Development (USAID) being the world's leading donor for humanitarian and development aid, there is scarce evidence in the literature assessing its impact on global health. Few evaluations have attempted to estimate the effects of USAID funding on maternal and child mortality in selected low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs), and some reports have offered only approximate estimates for specific diseases.
Strange that the American public was being made to fund these vast expenditures for so many decades, on apparently scarce scientific evidence for its effectiveness. You don't think anybody could possibly have any negative feelings about how the ruling class has been spending their money?