Czech mothers grow older, giving birth over 30

Aktualne.cz national news reporters
12. 9. 2008 6:00
Most women postpone their motherhood till later in life

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Autor fotografie: Aktuálně.cz

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Husák's Children

The term is used for the generation of children born in the 1970s when Gustáv Husák was the president of Czechoslovakia.

Husák was eventually succeeded by Václav Havel in December 1989 in the wake of what came to be known as the Velvet Revolution.

During the years of the so-called normalisation, which Husák oversaw and which came after the 1968 Soviet invasion killed the attempt to reform the socialist system in the country, the government policies of subsidized housing, long maternity leave and, crucially, the lack of anything else to do, combined to produce a genuine baby boom.

Its aftershocks are now beginning to be felt in the Czech Republic with "Husák's children" having their own offspring.

Prague - In the first half of 2008, the population of the Czech Republic grew by 44,000, largely due to immigration. 37,000 foreigners moved to the country in the first six months of 2008.

In the same time period, 59,323 children were born, which is 3,319 more than in the year-on-year comparison. 52,511 people died in 2008.

Those are the new figures that were recently released by the Czech Statistical Office. Based on them, the Czech Republic had 10,424,926 inhabitants on June 30, which is 43,796 more than in the end of 2007.

Birth? Over thirty

There were 28,000 first born children in 2008 with the average age of mothers who have their first child being 27. The overall average age of all women giving birth is 29. Most children were given birth by women who are already older than 30.

Read more: Baby boom and immigration prop up Czech population

About 21,000 children were born outside of wedlock, and 29 percent of single mothers did not list the name of the father of the child.

Weddings vs divorces

In the first half of 2008, 20,963 couples got married. Most of them tied the knot in June (about 9,000 couples).

On the other hand, 16,000 marriages got divorced. One fifth of them were couples that had their wedding less than five years ago. More than 9,000 couples seeking divorce had underage children. About 13,822 children will be growing up with divorced parents after the first half of 2008.

Dying in hospitals 

About sixty percent of all 52,500 people died in hospitals. Twenty percent of people died at their homes, 9 percent in a medical institution and 5 percent in a social care home. 180 babies died before their first birthday.

There were almost 40,000 foreigners that moved to the Czech Republic in the first six months of this year according to the population register managed by the Interior Ministry.

About 3,000 people left the country, more than one thousand of them were Czech citizens. Most immigrants came from Ukraine (almost 10,000), Vietnam (over 8,000) and Slovakia (3,700).

By the last day of June, 410,094 foreigners were living in the Czech Republic. They accounted for 3.9 percent of the population.

Read more: Life-span varies dramatically in the Czech Republic

 

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