The population of Brazil has reached 182 million, which means
it has almost doubled in a little over 30 years (93 million people lived in
Brazil in 1970).
Brazil’s government statistical bureau (IBGE) has just released a study on the Brazilian population that runs to the year 2050 (“Projeção da População do Brasil por Sexo e Idade para o período 1980-2050, Revisão 2004”).
It is now estimated that in 2050, Brazil could have 260 million inhabitants. According to the IBGE, that will make Brazil the 6th most populous nation in the world, behind India, with 1.531 billion; China, with 1.395 billion; the United States with 408 million; Paquistan, with 348 million; and Indonesia, with 294 million.
In 2000, Brazil was the 5th most populous nation in the world (Paquistan was smaller then). Its populational growth rate was 1.5 percent (in 94th place) in 2000.
This year it has fallen to 1.4 percent, slightly higher than the average world population growth rate of 1.24 percent. However, Brazilian populational growth should be 0.33 percent by the year 2045. And the IBGE says that at the present rate Brazil could reach zero populational growth in the year 2062.
Life expectancy for blacks in Brazil is seven years less than for whites, according to Fernanda Lopes, researcher and coordinator of the Health Component of the Program to Combat Institutional Racism.
A survey released in January, 2003, by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) indicates that, for the Brazilian population as a whole, life expectancy is 71 years.
“Compared to whites, blacks die prematurely from almost every kind of disorder. Black men and women expect to live less than whites in Brazil,” she affirmed, in Brasília, at the National Seminar on the Health of the Black Population. According to her, the only group whose life span is shorter are the Indians, who live 9 years less.
For Lopes, poverty, racism, poor living conditions, and inadequate housing, work, and sanitation are only some of the most frequent causes of low life expectancy. She also points to difficulties in access to information and quality healthcare.
According to the researcher, the World Health Organization (WHO) regards these causes of death as “avoidable.” “They are respiratory and contagious parasitic diseases that could be prevented, if decent living conditions or prenatal care of good quality existed and the specific needs of black, generally poor, women were considered,” she said.
Agência Brasil