NEW YORK — The number of births in the United States fell last year, resuming a long decline nationwide.
Just under 3.6 million babies were born in 2023, according to preliminary figures released Thursday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This was about 76,000 fewer people than the previous year, and the lowest annual figure since 1979.
The number of births in the United States, which had been on the decline for more than a decade before the coronavirus outbreak, fell by 4% from 2019 to 2020. After that, the number increased for the second consecutive year, and experts say one reason for this increase is that couples postponed pregnancy due to the spread of infection. Early days of the pandemic.
But “the numbers for 2023 seem to indicate that the uptick is over and we're back to trends like before,” and how social policies and other factors will affect health and fertility. said Nicholas Mark, a researcher at the University of Wisconsin.
Experts say birth rates have long been declining for teenagers and young women, but rising for women in their 30s and 40s. They say this reflects a woman pursuing education and a career before trying to start her family. But last year, birthrates fell for all women under 40, but remained flat for women in their 40s.
Mark called the development surprising, saying: “There's some evidence that it's not just more postponements.”
Rates declined in nearly every racial and ethnic group.
The figures released Thursday are based on more than 99.9% of birth certificates submitted in 2023, but are provisional and the final number of births is subject to change once confirmed. For example, while preliminary 2022 birth numbers appeared to show a decline, they ended up being higher than the 2021 tally when the analysis was completed.
The CDC's Brady Hamilton, lead author of the new report, said the 2023 data could be adjusted, but not enough to erase the “significant” decline seen in the preliminary numbers. .
Experts are questioning how a June 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that allows states to ban or limit abortions will affect births. Experts estimate that nearly half of pregnancies are unintended, so restricting access to abortion could affect the number of births.
The new report shows that this decision did not lead to an increase in births nationwide, but researchers analyzed birth trends in individual states and analyzed data for all demographic groups. I didn't.
New data raises the possibility that teenagers may be affected. Although the U.S. teen birth rate has been declining for decades, the decline has been less dramatic in recent years and appears to have stopped for teenage girls ages 15 to 17.
“It could be Dobbs,” says Dr. John Santelli, professor of population and family health and pediatrics at Columbia University. Or it could be related to changes in sex education or access to contraception, he added.
In any case, it's alarming that high school birth rates have leveled off, showing that “everything we're doing with middle school and high school kids is stalling.” said Santelli.
Further findings from the report:
– From 2022 to 2023, the preliminary number of births will decrease by 5% for American Indian and Alaska Native women, 4% for black women, 3% for white women, and 2% for Asian American women. Births to Hispanic women increased by 1%.
-The proportion of babies born prematurely remained almost constant.
– The caesarean section birth rate has risen again to 32.4% of births. Some experts worry that C-sections are being performed more often than medically necessary.
-The United States was once one of the few developed countries with a birth rate (about 2.1 children per woman) that allowed each generation to have enough children to replace them. However, it has since declined, reaching an all-time low of approximately 1.6 in 2023.
Research shows that many American couples want to have more than one child, but consider housing, job security, and childcare costs to be major obstacles to having more children.
“Something is getting in the way of them achieving these goals,” Mark said.
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