The fall in the birth rate has hit France, Italy and Spain very markedly, nine months after the start of the confinement periods, explains the Financial Times. Demographers point to the health crisis.
The Covid-19 pandemic is not only causing excess mortality in many countries, but also a considerable drop in the birth rate in several of them.
In France, INSEE was one of the first organizations to publish figures on the number of children born in January 2021, nine months after the start of the first confinement. Data collected so far shows a striking decline, as there were 13% fewer births compared to January 2020, for a total of 53,900 newborns.
In France, the country which usually has the highest birth rate of the 27 countries of the European Union, the fall is the sharpest since the abrupt end of the baby boom in the 1970s.
Births at their lowest since 1945
Births were also 7% less numerous in December 2020 than in December 2019. And throughout the year 2020, France saw the birth of 735,000 babies, the lowest figure since the end of World War II.
“Many imagine that when couples stay at home, they have more children. But it’s an idyllic view of things, analysis Anne Solaz, research director at the National Institute of Demographic Studies (INED). Besides, there are some who find it difficult to get together all the time. ”
Preliminary data also shows a sharp drop in the number of births in Spain and Italy, two states already facing the challenge of an aging population. The figures show trends comparable to
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Victor Mallet (in Paris) Daniel Dombey (in Madrid) and Martin Arnold (in Frankfurt)
Source
Founded in 1888 under the name of London Financial Guide, a four-page journal intended “To honest investors and respectable brokers”, the Financial Times is today the financial and economic daily
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