Our era of numbers
Our contemporary world is overwhelmed with numbers. The reality of this is in telephone number(s) – mobile or landline --, hall, hostel, motel or hotel room numbers (especially for students, travellers in transit, etc.).
My thought of numbers is hardly complete without some consideration of lotto numbers. Interestingly, there are winning (five out of 90), machine, shadow, jumping, flying, sure bankers and what have you or have not numbers – big thanks to my lotto “professor” friend.
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I am fondly reminded of a whole chapter in the Bible (the fifth in the Old Testament) devoted to Numbers, and related to the popular “movement of God’s people”.
Bible, numbers
The Bible is replete with numbers. The account of Jesus fasting for 40 days and 40 nights, Noah’s ark being operational for 40 days, the multiplication of five loaves of bread and two fishes to feed thousands of people, leaving a surplus of a number of baskets, and a whole lot more.
Other myriad of numbers are passport numbers, postal box numbers, staff and student ID numbers, examination index numbers, hospital card and bed numbers, vehicle registration numbers, Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), prison ID number, mortuary tag number, among a host of others.
NB: I have formally taught numbers in various forms and institutions as Applied Statistics, Biometry, Statistics for biologists, Statistics for social scientists, Biostatistics, Epidemiological Statistics, et cetera - new assuming (re)designations are Numerology and Data Science.
National identification drive
The most recent activity in vogue relates to the issuance of the National Identification Authority (NIA) cards, which are meant to replace the old voters’ ID card.
In effect, the average adult person would, in all probability, be handicapped in one significant way or another without a valid ID number, especially at the Legon branch of my bankers.
United Nations country classification
The good-old United Nations system also makes remarkable reference to numbers. Each specialised arm classifies countries by their specific indicators and has devised unique ways of classifying member countries.
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The ostensible purpose of this exercise is to aggregate, group and compare statistically relevant data, as well as for the objective assessment of the economic performance(s) of member States.
The main classifications are by geographic region, income grouping and, sometimes, the operational lending categories of the World Bank (WB) Group.
The recent WB categories are: “low” (<USD 1,046), “lower-middle” (USD 1,046 – 4,095), “upper-middle” (USD 4,096 – 12,695) and “high” – income (>USD 12,695) countries. (Ghana ranked 33 out of 189 countries so included).
Others
The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) ranks countries on the basis of Dietary Energy Supply (DES), a proxy for agricultural productivity and/or trade, and/or food and/or nutrition security.
The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) categorises nations by Under-five Mortality Rate (U5MR). Ghana’s current figure is 44.7 per 1,000 live births.
The UN Development Programme (UNDP) does so similarly, but on the basis of its innovative Human Development Index (HDI). This is a statistically fascinating composite measure of development.
It applies the average achievement(s) in a country, namely: (i) a long and healthy life (expectancy), (ii) access to knowledge (educational attainment) and (iii) a decent standard of living (quality of life, indicators of happiness). Ghana’s recent HDI was reported at 0.63.
UNICEF on its part classifies countries on the basis of U5MR; Ghana ranks 44 out of 193 countries.
Numbers have enormous value and must be appreciated in our quest for socio-economic advancement.
The writer is a Harvard-trained freelance writer on science and public health matters. E-mail: wbowusu2021@gmail.com