In Hungary, the most important fertility indicator increased only in Hungary G7
The Human Fertility Database (HFD) project, launched by the Vienna Institute for Demography and the Max Planck Institute in Rostock, shows fertility trends in nearly 40 countries with a few clicks. The graphs page shows that between January 2020 and September 2021, the relative number of live births in Hungary was almost higher than the monthly average of the years between 2017 and 2019. There was a more serious fall only in December and January, as a result of some 9 previous first quarantine measures.
Temporary fall
The baby boom, which was previously mentioned in connection with restrictive measures and quarantine, has lagged behind the world, and birth rates have fallen, as usual in general social crises, economic crises or locally devastating epidemics in areas where modern contraceptives are widely available and the majority of women work. Because
- financial and health concerns,
- the increase in stress associated with a crisis situation,
- delaying marriages,
- the reduction of meeting opportunities for individuals,
- home digital school instead of attendance,
- the exclusion of grandparents from childcare
they are all forcing couples to postpone having children. Thus, the total fertility rate usually falls.*The total fertility rate or rate refers to the number of children per woman of childbearing age. In fact, it shows that if the fertility data for a given year were to stabilize, it would give an average number of children in a woman’s life.
Even the sharp decline in the desire to have children has proved to be only temporary in many countries. Based on November-December 2020 and January 2021, social researchers have previously found a decline of between 3 and 8 percent in the 15 countries of the European Union over the same month last year. In Hungary, the number of births fell in December 2020 and January 2021 on 7.9 and 9.8, respectively, compared to the same month of the previous year.
This drastic but short-term decline stops, and it was not enough to reverse the growth trend of Hungarian childhood in the long run.
Minus the pointer
The above Hungarian data series depicted in the graphic is unique in the region. In the Czech Republic, Austria, Romania, Ukraine and Slovenia, the indicator was negative for the whole period last year and this year, meaning that the number of births was almost lower than the monthly averages of the years before the coronavirus. This year, presumably with the deepening of the further effects of the coronavirus, newer falls can be seen with the Hungarian curve.
The curve is negative in Poland as well – the Hungarian birth rate curve is thus most comparable to the Danish and Dutch ones, more people were born in these societies this year than in the given period before the coronavirus.
In terms of the wider region, we do not yet have definitive data for all countries, such as Croatia, but it is very likely that Hungary is the only country where the total fertility rate increased in 2020 to 1.49-1.56 in the period affected by the virus.
Tomas Sobotka, one of the leaders of the HFD, confirmed our assumption.
It is only worth emphasizing that not all countries experienced a decline, in the Czech Republic the total fertility rate stagnated at 1.71 in 2020
He added.
The data collected so far allow us to conclude that even in the first half of 2021, the total fertility rate in Hungary increased. The researcher Krystof Zeman, who is also working on the project, estimates that the absolute number of births in Hungary was only very low in the year – + 0.7% between January and June, + 0.2% between January and September, but
the overall fertility rate is expected to increase more, to 1.60-1.62.
Only the overall fertility rate will start to rise this year in the region as well as in Austria and the Czech Republic.
From low point to midfield
Hungary’s fertility rate was at an all-time low in 2011 and has been stagnating since then, in line with the government’s key demographic targets and the need to have children, mainly through various financial stimulus measures. The fertility rate estimated for 2021, which belongs to the European midfield and is slightly above 1.6, last occurred in 1994 in Hungary.
Only the goal announced by the Orbán governments is to reach the last 2.1 produced in the 1970s to keep the population level by 2030, so it still seems a bit utopian. According to demographer Captain Balázs in such a time frame, at least a maximum of 1.8 is realistic, but can only be achieved with a very successful and consistent population policy for decades.
rather, the increase in the fertility rate in Hungary hardly means more newborns, as there are fewer women of childbearing age behind the higher indicator. So to put it simply: slightly fewer women have slightly more children at birth.
Excessive deaths and lost years
However, coronavirus affects not only fertility rates but also mortality data. Short-term mortality trends are being led by the aforementioned Human Mortality Database project in Rostock, a joint project with the Demography Department of the University of California, Berkeley. can be retrieved in pairs in a graphical system.
The curves below plot the mortality rates for the weeks of 2020. The blue curve shows the average mortality rates for the given periods of 2017-2019, the orange parts show the excess mortality for 2021, and the light fields show the decrease in mortality for that period. Hungary is no longer setting a positive example in this area, in fact.
The researchers have not yet calculated the combined effect of the two data sets, ie the population change in the years of the coronavirus epidemic, based on recent data.
However, the impact of the pandemic on life expectancy is based on data from the Human Mortality Database project in November. published a study in a prestigious journal: Of the 35 countries surveyed, life expectancy at birth fell almost everywhere, but most in Russia, the United States, Bulgaria, Lithuania and Poland.
Hungary is in the middle, with a decline of around 1 year.
The research team uses statistical methods to calculate the number of “years lost” by 2020 due to a decline in life expectancy: a total of 28 million life years have been lost in 31 countries. The number of years lost to the coronavirus is five times higher than in the 2015 flu pandemic, the study writes. According to the number of lost years per thousand people per country, Hungary is the eighth.
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