Picture, if you will, a world gone insane. A world where you cannot attend school, buy food or clothing, or even walk down the street without risking capture and imprisonment.
Christians and Jews have been declared outlaws and enemies, stripped of their rights, and condemned to quick death or slow death in concentration camps.
As have atheists. As have observant Muslims and Hindus. All those who refuse to worship the Beast and his image.
Even with the Bowl judgements over, humanity is still in danger of extinction. The Earth's population is still dwindling steadily. The new dangers posed by the judgments, the lack of medical resources in many areas, and the psychological damage suffered by many of the survivors have stopped population growth.
Instead of increasing, the human population has continued to decline. In a matter of three and a half years there may not be enough humans to support the technological level of the planet - and that may cause the extinction of humankind.
This creates an enormous dilemma for the governments of Earth. On the one hand, human life has become incredibly precious. There are not enough people to do the jobs that need to be done, so everyone has an increased responsibility to be as productive and useful as possible. The people who assume responsibilities quickly work themselves into exhaustion. Scientists in particular suffer tremendously from stress; there is always a huge backlog of observations and specimens and new theories to be analyzed and studied. Knowing that a delay in processing that information can cost thousands of lives or even lose the battle for survival makes the pressure on all technical workers even worse.
On the other hand, many survivors are too damaged and dysfunctional to contribute to society. Caring for these people may drain so much in human resources that the chances of recovery will be even worse than before. Some hard choices are being made in many nations ... it may not be too long before drastic measures are taken to "deal" with those who cannot contribute to the war effort. Already in the U.S., hardened criminals, feral children and the hopelessly insane are coldly executed under the Emergency Euthanasia Bill. Whether the walking wounded are killed or cared for, however, the recede will
continue.