According to UN estimates, India overtook China around April 2023, with roughly 1.43 billion people. China had held the top spot ever since the UN's first estimates in 1950. The switch reflects two opposite paths: China's population began shrinking in 2022, for the first time since the early 1960s, while India's keeps growing, albeit more slowly. The UN expects India to stay in first place for the rest of the century.
That's the estimate from a WHO-led study published in The Lancet in 2024, covering the half-century since the Expanded Programme on Immunization was launched in 1974. It works out to about six lives saved every minute, mostly infants. The measles vaccine alone accounts for around 60% of those lives.
According to the World Gold Council, about 216,000 tonnes of gold have been mined in all of human history. Because gold is so dense (19.3 tonnes per cubic metre), it would fit in a cube about 22 metres on each side, roughly the height of a seven-storey building. Strikingly, about two-thirds of it has been mined since 1950.