Despite lockdown, US birthrate dropped sharply in 2020
Washington (AFP) - A predicted baby boom failed to materialize in the United States in 2020, with births down four percent compared to the year before despite Covid-19 lockdowns, an official report said Wednesday. Some 3.6 million babies were born in 2020, according to the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS). It was the sixth consecutive year that births have declined after an increase in 2014, and the lowest number of births since 1979. The provisional total fertility rate was 1,637.5 births per 1,000 women, which equates to 1.6 children per woman -- well below the 2.1 required to en...