Longer lifespans could be a blow for Asia

Fall in birthrates leads to older populations and small workforces

HONG KONG - For more than two decades, the Catholic Church in the Philippines, Asia's only predominantly Catholic country, has opposed a Reproductive Health Bill that seeks to give poor people access to free contraceptives. The issue, Archbishop Socrates Villegas said in a statement, should be decided by "faith not opinions".

But amid the raging faith-versus-opinion debate, statistics reveal that the population of the Philippines is exploding. According to the United Nations Population Division, at the current rate of growth, the 93 million people now living in the country could grow to 100 million by 2015, and 150 million by 2050.