i think the idea behind it, is that you give the people the chance to live, no matter how ill they are. and when God decides that there time has come, they will die, no matter what, and without "help" from others. and the idea is also that if you don't help the people to survive you did a bad thing (not only doing bad things is a sin, but also not helping or not doing a good thing is a sin).

so much about the idea behind this, not saying that it is also my opinion. because i don't think that there's a God that decides whether somebody's time has come or not, the whole thing turns in a totally different discussion, but as long as you believe it (and the pope believes it and all catolics believe it in the eyes of the catholic chruch), his statement somehow does make sense.

but like davefan said: the reality looks totally different and also his statements of no sex before merriage or no condoms etc. seem really strange in our time. (well ok, i could accept the "no sex before merriage", but "using condoms is a sin" is really really stupid, especially because there are catholic countries in africa where people believe him, and where they have thousands of AIDS-victims every year)