The birth rate has been declining since 2010 and this year is no different according to the Central Statistics Office's annual Vital Statistics Report just published.
Fertility rates:
According to the report, the current figures for Irish fertility rates suggest that the Irish may not be reproducing enough to replace our population which stands at 4,609,600. The fertility rate (projected number of children parents are expected to have) is an average of 1.95 children per mother. An average of 2.1 children per mother is generally accepted as being enough to maintain a population, so collectively we may need to get on this so to speak.
Teenage mothers:
"A total of 1,253 teenagers had babies in 2014, of these 23 were aged under 16."
Marriage rates:
The average age for first-time Irish mums is also increasing (30.5 in 2014, a 0.3-year increase on 2013) though so is the average age for people getting married. According to the report more of us than ever are tying the knot with 22,045 marriages registered last year which was a marked increase of seven per cent on the previous year. Hopefully this number will increase further in 2015 with our new laws in place.
Death rates:
On even better news it seems that we, as a population, have uncovered the key to immortality. Okay, not quite, but death rates are down 3.1 per cent in 2014 (from 30,018 recorded in 2013 to 29,095 last year).
80 per cent of the deaths registered last year were people aged 65 and older. Tragically there were 459 deaths by suicide registered in 2014 and almost 70 per cent of those were men.
"The leading cause of death in 2014 varied widely by age group. Among young adults aged 15 to 44, external causes of death including accidents, suicide and other ranked first (631 deaths). Among individuals aged 45-84, cancers were the leading cause, while for those aged 85 and older, it was diseases of the heart and arteries."
