People around the world have had fewer and fewer children, and that is not always because they don’t want them.
The global fertility percentage has fallen on average to less than half of what it was in the sixties, the United Nations has foundThe “replacement level” includes that is necessary to maintain the current population in most countries.
In the midst of that historical decline, almost 20% of adults of reproductive age believes from 14 countries around the world that they will have the number of children they want, the Population Fund of the United Nations (UNFPA), the sexual and reproductive health and law agency of the UN, in a report released this week. For most of them, the report showed that it is not infertility to prevent them from doing this. They pointed to factors such as financial limitations, barriers to fertility or pregnancy -related medical care and the fear of the state of the world that they say they hinder their own fertility and reproductive choices.
“There are a lot of people out there who are willing to have children-and have more children than they have–IF the conditions were right, and the government’s bond is to provide those measures or well-balance, which is a good work-lifoym Provide Better Health Care and Services, ”Says Shalini Randeria, The President of the Central European University in Vienna and the Senior External Advisor for the UNFPA Report. But she says that policies implement that some governments implement – such as cutting medicaid in the US and enforcing limitations on reproductive health and autonomy – are both a step back for the rights of people and “counterproductive from a demographic point of view.”
Read more: Why so many women wait longer to have children
UNFPA conducted a study for the report, in collaboration with Yougov, from people in 14 countries in Asia, Europe, North -America, South America and Africa who together represent more than a third of the world’s population.
“There is a gap between the number of children that people would have liked and the number they had,” says Randeria. “For us it was important to find out – by asking them – what it is that this gap causes.”
Financial barriers
The most important respondents of the barriers survey who identified themselves to have the number of children they wanted were economic: 39% mentioned financial limitations, 19% home restrictions, 12% lack of sufficient or high -quality childcare options and 21% unemployment or employment.
The prices for all types of goods and services have risen rapidly in recent years. Global inflation reached the highest level that has been seen since the mid -1990s in July 2022, according to the World bank group. Although it has fallen since then, the current levels are still considerably above those before the COVID-19 Pandemie.
Read more: Why affordable childcare is out of reach for so many people
Rising costs have hardly affected both homes and childcare. In the US, for example, the Ministry of Finance has established that the housing costs have Increased faster than income Over the past two decades, around 65% has risen since 2000 when adapted for inflation. And research has shown that the costs of childcare in the US have shot in recent years, excess What many Americans pay for housing or university.
The current housing crisis influences ‘every region and country’, said the Human Settlement program of the United Nations in a report Last year estimates that between 1.6 billion and 3 billion people around the world do not have enough housing.
Reproductive obstacles
People quoted other factors that they also have as many children as they want, including barriers for assisted reproduction and surrogacy.
Have different countries – including France, Spain, Germany and Italy – forbidden surrogacy. The UNFPA report also points out that many countries limit or ban access to assisted reproduction and surrogacy for couples of the same sex. In Europe, for example, only 17 of the 49 countries allow medically supported insemination for people, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity, according to the report.
The Undepa notes That, as global fertility rates fall, some governments “take drastic measures to encourage young people to make fertility decisions in accordance with national goals.” But the report argues that the “real crisis” “is a crisis in reproductive freedom of choice – in the ability of individuals to make their own free, informed and unobstructed choices about everything, from sex to the use of contraception to founding a family.”
According to the Center for Reproductive Rights40% of women of reproductive age all over the world live under restrictive abortion laws. Many countries – including Brazil” The PhilippinesAnd PolandAmong other things – the abortion have seriously limited. In 2022, the American Supreme Court destroyed the milestone statement Roe v. Wade, the constitutional right to abortion. Since More than a dozen states have determined almost total prohibited or limited abortion. There have been many reports that pregnant people have denied critical care because of the state laws that limit abortions, and many women have said that they do not feel safe to be pregnant in states where abortion is banned.
And although a growing proportion of women around the world meets their needs in the field of family planning, around 164 million were still not from 2021, the UN found In a report released in 2022.
In addition to considering access to family planning, a human right, also the UN notes That it is the key to reduce poverty.
Fear of the future
About 14% of the respondents in the UNFPA report said that concern about political or social situations, such as wars and pandemies, would lead or have already led to fewer children than they had wanted. And about 9% of the respondents said that worries about climate change or damage to the environment would lead or have already led to fewer children than they had desired.
Read more: Terrestrial for climate change? You may have eco anxiety
Violence and conflicts have risen in the world in recent years. The period between 2021 and 2023 was the most violent according to the end of the Cold War The World Bank GroupAnd the number of both combat and violent conflicts has risen over the past decade.
That violence has contributed to years of increasing relocation: more than 122 million people around the world are displaced with violence, the UN refugee office reported Thursday, almost double the song that was recorded ten years ago.
The impact of the global pandemic is even more widely felt, and it is unlikely that it will soon fade out of someone’s memory as soon as COVID-19 will continue to spread, develop new variants and take a toll from people whose recovery of the virus can take months or even years. Even beyond Covid, outbreaks of infectious diseases become more and more commonplace – and become Predict experts That in the coming years the risk that those outbreaks that escalate in epidemics and pandemies will rise alone.
In a 2024 UN -Development Program -SurveyThat statistically, about 87% of the world’s population represents, about 56% of the respondents said that they thought of climate change daily or weekly. About 53% of the respondents also said that they were now more concerned about climate change than a year earlier. A third of the respondents said that climate change significantly influences their most important decisions of life.
“I want children, but it becomes more difficult as time passes,” a 29-year-old woman from Mexico is quoted in the report. “It is impossible to buy or have affordable rent in my city. I also do not want to give birth to a child in war times and worsen the planetary disorders if that means that the baby would suffer from it.”
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