Record number
Baby boom in Germany: There have not been as many births as in March 2021 for more than 20 years
Record number: In March 2021, 10 percent more babies were born than in March of the previous year (symbol image)
© Ternavskaia Olga Alibec / Shutterstock
What do you do when social life is idle? Babies, obviously! According to the Federal Statistical Office, there was a record 65,903 births in Germany in March 2021.
The other day we asked ourselves whether all women are actually pregnant. As soon as it got warmer, so that the thick winter coats could stay in the closet, they appeared, the baby bellies. And those who were not visibly pregnant were already pushing a stroller. What a few weeks ago was a subjective impression when strolling through one’s own neighborhood has now been substantiated with figures by the Federal Statistical Office: In fact, significantly more babies saw the light of day in March 2021 – ten percent more than in 2020! The corona pandemic even led to a record value that has not been reached in the past more than 20 years, reported the Federal Statistical Office via Twitter.
Of course, it is reasonable to assume that this record number is related to the corona pandemic. We have lacked any distraction that draws us out of the house in better times. Theater evenings, vernissages, concerts, visits to the cinema or the fitness studio, we had to do without all of that almost entirely. The safest place for us was our own home, the safest society was the people with whom we live or are together.
Baby time
Pursuing individual passions was so difficult that we almost only left the sofa at home to shop for groceries. The interesting side effect was obviously that we had more time for other passions, love for example. Even if this inevitably led to more sex in the relationship for all couples, the subject of family planning evidently came to the fore.
Times of uncertainty due to climate change, migration, a crisis of democracy or a global pandemic pose great challenges for people, but they are always times of change and departure. But they also promote the longing for inner stability, as we expect from the smallest social unit, the family, for example. Thus, the year 2021 brought out what had not been the case for decades: a generation of baby boomers.
This article originally appeared on stern.de.