birth

South Korea has had the most catastrophic birth rate in the world for years. And now it has finally managed to grow

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For a few years now, talking about demographics in South Korea has made it necessary to first take out a clinex package. Despite all his attempts (and there have been not a few) the country seemed condemned to suffer an uncontrollable ‘bleed’ of birth rates and see the seams of its economy tighten. It may sound exaggerated, but it is good to remember that he said goodbye to 2024 by declaring “super aged” and that there are academics who warn that the nation is emptying (literally). With that backdrop, Seoul has started 2026 with a positive fact: wins babies. And it also does so for the second consecutive year. The big question that arises now is… Are we facing a change in trend or just a mirage? The figure: 254,457. It is provisional data (the definitio will not arrive until the summer), but even so it has arrived like manna in a country accustomed to every piece of news about demographics involving a national drama. Last year South Korea registered 254,457 birthsa good balance no matter where you look at it. To begin with because it means 6.8% more that in 2024 and leaves the largest percentage increase since 2007; but those are only two of the possible readings. More babies per woman. Another interesting reading is the one that tells us about the “fertility rate”, the average number of babies that (at a statistical level) a woman is expected to have throughout her reproductive life. A few years ago that indicator plummeted to 0.72very far from the “replacement rate” (2.1 children per woman) that allows societies to remain stable. The data is still below that red line, but at least it has grown: in 2025 it passed from 0.75 to 0.8. Not only that. Reuters remember that the South Korean Government had optimistic estimates that suggested that this rate would grow to 0.75 in 2025 and 0.8 in 2026, which appears to be recovering positions faster than expected. In Seoul the trend is even more pronounced. There the indicator rose 8.9%, going from 0.53 to 0.63. The data is still very poor and they are far away to solve the problem that Korea has, but they suggest a change of cycle. Breaking the bad streak. That the birth rate is increasing in South Korea is news, but it is even more so if (as is the case) that growth is maintained for two years. In 2024 the country has already registered a positive fact (breaking up with eight exercises of consecutive falls) that now invites us to think about whether it has really found the right way to encourage its young people to have more offspring. Of course, the country has invested time, efforts and especially economic resources in that objective, in which it is played from the social sustainability and the march of his industry to issues as relevant as national defense. More weddings, more babies. 2025 has not only been a good year in maternity hospitals. It has also been for the wedding planners. Marriages increased by 8.1% in 2025, reinforcing the 14.8% rebound already recorded in 2024. This is good news because, in a conservative society like South Korea (the percentage of births outside of marriage It’s surprisingly low.), weddings are often considered an early indicator of a rebound in birth rates. Trend or mirage? That’s the million dollar question. That South Korea has been trying to activate its birth rate for years is undeniable, as is the fact that it has invested large resources in this effort and that they have been involved in the effort since the public institutions to the business world. However, there are other factors at play that suggest that the recent growth in the South Korean birth rate could be more circumstantial than structural. That is to say, in reality we would be facing a kind of demographic ‘mirage’. The hangover of the pandemic. When explaining the phenomenon, there are those who point to the influence of the pandemic. Not so much in the birth rate itself as in marriages. It is true that more South Koreans are getting tired and that this indicator will probably influence the birth rate in the coming years, but it is also true that many couples had to postpone their plans during the pandemic. “The number of marriages has increased for 21 consecutive months, from April 2024 to December last year, as couples who had delayed their marriages due to COVID-19 have tied the knot,” recognize Park Hyun-jung, director of the government office that analyzes population trends. He himself admits that today it is very difficult to establish a clear “correlation” between government policies and improved birth rates. A demographic with ‘echo’. There are those who point out, however, another factor that would be directly influencing South Korean demographics: history. The explanation I broke it down Rapahel Rashid recently in Guardian and provides an alternative theory. More babies have been born in the South Korea of ​​2024 or 2025 simply because the same thing already happened in the Korea of ​​30 years ago. To be more precise, more or less during the first half of the 1990s (1991-1995) there was a peak of around 3.6 million of babies who today enter their thirties and begin to become parents themselves. Reviewing history. We explain ourselves. Paradoxical as it may be, in the 1950s and 1960s Korea had a very different problem than today: a very high fertility rate which led authorities to launch family planning programs. The objective: guarantee the country’s recovery after the war. The message that was launched was very simple: have fewer children (two, one) and guarantee them a better life. It worked so well that by the early 1980s the fertility rate had fallen below the replacement margin and Seoul decided change course. By doing so, it favored the rebound that would now be heating up the birth rate. According to that theory, what we see today is actually a … Read more

Jesus was not born in the year 1 or on December 25. Here’s what we know about his actual and exact date of birth

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With Jesus of Nazareth something curious happens. Few characters have been more celebrated, discussed and reviewed throughout the centuries. Today historians they usually coincide in which (although there is no material evidence of its existence) was a historical figure that can be framed in the Galilee of 2,000 years ago. However, despite all the attention he has received over the last 20 centuries, there are certain key details of his biography that remain shrouded in shadows. For example the date of your birth. And by “date” we don’t just mean the day, but also the year. When discussing, we could even question where was he born. The usual thing is to think that Jesus came into the world on December 25 in Bethlehem of Judea and that six days later humanity (at least the West or the West of Christian influence) entered into a new eraone in which history was dislocated into two stages that we still use today in the 21st century, whether we are Christians or not: the one before and the one after the birth of Christ (Anno Domini). Totally normal, right? That is, why else would we celebrate Christmas every December 25th, a word that comes from the Latin “https://www.xataka.com/magnet/nativitas” (“birth”)? And why do we talk about years BC and AD if it is not for the birth of Christ? Reality is more complicated and has some chiaroscuros. What do we know about the birth of Jesus? The answer to the previous question is very simple: little. Historians usually agree that there are basically two sources to address the topic of the birth of Jesus and both are reflected in the same work: the New Testament of the Bible. The evangelist gives us a clue Matthew. The other, Luke. The problem is not only the scarcity of information, but that both texts were written many decades after the events they narrate. To be more precise, around 80 and 90 AD, half a century after the crucifixion. Of course in the New Testament there are older texts (such as the letters of Paul or even the gospel of Mark, written around 70 AD), but they are of little use if what interests us is the childhood (and especially the birth) of Jesus. Taking into account the few references there are and the importance of the topic (we are talking about the birth of the central character of one of the most influential religions in history), it would be logical that Matthew and Luke coincide in their stories. It’s not like that. In their texts both offer us what experts call “chronological anchors”references that help us date the birth of Jesus, but those clues are scarce and do not quite fit together. What exactly do they tell us? Let’s see. “And when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of King Herod, behold, wise men came from the east to Jerusalem, saying, ‘Where is the King of the Jews who has been born? For we have seen his star in the east, and we have come to worship him. When Herod heard this, he was troubled, and Jerusalem with him.’ Matthew 2:2-4 “And it came to pass in those days that an edict went out from Augustus Caesar, that all the land should be enumerated. This first enumeration was made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria. And they all went to be enumerated, each one to his city. Then Joseph went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David, to be registered with Mary, his wife, who was betrothed to him, who was with child. And it came to pass that while they were there, the days were fulfilled in which she was to give birth.” Luke 2:2-7 Although it may not seem like it a priori, both passages hide a small discrepancy, as explains in Wake up Ferro Professor Javier Alonso, philologist, historian and biblical scholar. The evangelist Matthew (and Luke) tells us that Jesus was born in the time of King Herod, but then Luke specifies that Mary was counted while she and Joseph were traveling to fulfill the census ordered in the time of Augustus. If we review history we see that both “anchors” they collide with each other. Herod the Greatruler under the orders of Rome, ruled Judea more or less between 40 and 4 BCyear of his death. As for the census that Luke tells us about, historians believe that it coincided with the census carried out by Quirinus in the time of Augustus, a fact mentioned by Flavius ​​Josephus. The problem, remember Alonsois that Quirinus ruled around 6 AD the region that covers Judea, years after the death of Herod. Conclusion? Both evangelists are actually drawing a fairly broad time frame, of a decade, that could be set between the years prior to the king’s death and 6 AD “There is a difference of at least 10 years between Matthew and Luke,” explains Alonso. Why do we say that Jesus was born when he was born? At this point that is the most reasonable question. If the evangelists point to a time horizon that begins several years before our era (Anno Domini), because devils Do we say that Jesus was born a few days before the 1st AD? Who and how set that date? To answer these questions we must go back a few centuries, although without reaching the era of Herod. Our attention will focus on beginning of the 5th ADwhen at the request of the Pope the Scythian monk Dionysus ‘the Exiguous’ He launched into a difficult task: calculating the date of Christ’s birth. It may sound strange that so many centuries later the followers of Jesus would worry about this question, but at stake there was a primary issue: clarifying when Easter should be celebrated (Computus paschalis), the main celebration of Christianity. Its date … Read more

Countries are desperate to raise their birth rates. They have a very simple weapon to apply: teleworking

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He aging population is one of the most pressing problems for large economies around the world. The birth rate is a pillar in a country’s economy, since the economy, the labor market, education and health, among many other policies, depend on it. When governments talk about “birth crisis“, they almost always resort to the same repertoire of solutions: baby checks, tax deductions or daycare aid. The problem is that, after years of applying them, fertility in most rich countries continues on the ground. However, a new study raises a new perspective: what if the solution to the birth rate problem was in the way we work? In that scenario, teleworking appears as a surprisingly powerful lever. Telework to have more children. a study carried out by researchers at Stanford University has discovered that offering work flexibility and teleworking improves the fertility rate in couples in which one of the members teleworks. The researchers did not measure the number of births (natality), but rather the fertility indicator. That is, the number of children that participants say they plan to have. The result is difficult to ignore because someone who does not have free time or who considers that they could not take on the upbringing of a child, nor do they consider having one. That is to say, there is no such predisposition, which does not help the birth rate grows. According to the study, going from having no teleworking option to teleworking five days a week is associated with an approximate increase of 0.13 children per woman in terms of expected fertility. This is equivalent to an increase of between 7% and 8% over the average of the group analyzed. Birth and fertility are not the same. It should be noted that talking about birth and fertility represents different scenarios, and this confusion can distort the debate. The birth rate It is the number of births that occur in a country during a specific period. It is the most common data when talking about birth rate since it determines, in real terms, the number of annual births, and allows it to be compared with the number of deaths to establish the demographic balance. Fertility, on the other hand, is a background indicator. It represents the number of children a woman has (or is expected to have) throughout her life. It is usually expressed as Global Fertility Rate (TGF). The difference between both concepts is important. While the birth rate can vary from year to year (for example, advancing decisions or in response to certain policies) without changing the structural trend, the fertility rate is a long-term metric: it indicates whether a woman plans to have only one child (no matter the year) or more. Motivated to have children. Examples like South Korea or Japan They show how complicated, and how expensive, it is to change a downward birth rate trend. That is why the increase in the intention to have children, without making any investment or applying additional fiscal policies, is very striking. The results of the study suggest that, perhaps, the way forward is not to subsidize the birth of more children, but rather to make the organization of parents’ work compatible with their upbringing. It’s not for money: it’s for time. For years, the political response has been fairly predictable. Having children is expensiveso you have to put money on the table to lighten that burden. The problem is that, although in most homes they need two salaries To survive, the truly scarce resource is time to take care of the children. Teleworking and flexible hours have reduced this daily friction since it implies less time traveling, greater control over schedules and, above all, greater ability to react to unforeseen events. for child care. The report ‘Women in the Workplace’ prepared by McKinsey showed that the lack of flexible hours forces many women to reduce their hours or stagnate their professional career. On this point, the conclusions of the Stanford researchers fit with the data that Pew Research got In a previous survey: Even with the difficulties of reconciling family and work, the majority of respondents considered it necessary to continue working and did not want to sacrifice their professional careers. What they needed was a job that does not make work life and childcare incompatible. It needs investment, but it is cheap. The study concludes that to match the fertility rate achieved by teleworking, it would be necessary to apply fiscal policies and incentives at a much higher cost. Subsidized childcare can improve the situation, but none of these measures make it easier. child care on a day-to-day basis, nor does it encourage families to have more children that complicate logistics even more. The time availability and flexibility of teleworking does. This does not mean that the implementation of teleworking is free. Has organizational costs for companiesyou cannot telework in all sectors and it can generate inequalities between employees whose positions do allow teleworking and those who do not. In Xataka | We have been teleworking for four years and a study has reached a conclusion: working from home makes us happier Image | Pexels (Anastasia Shuraeva)

China has done everything to stop its population bleeding. The result is the lowest birth rate since 1949

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China has encountered an even more complex challenge than the real estate crisis, the trade war with the US or the future of Taiwan: the babies. As your birth rate deflates (leaving the number of newborns below the number of deaths) the Asian giant is becoming less and less “giant”, a trend that threatens to punish the nation’s economy. Beijing knows it and that is why it takes time deploying measures that seek to boost their demographics. The problem is that, despite his many efforts, he can’t hit the nail on the head. Your latest official data birth rates show a new setback. What has happened? That despite all its efforts, China has not been able to stop its demographic hemorrhage. This is how it reveals the last balance from the National Bureau of Statistics of China (NBS), which shows a scenario similar to that suffered by other nations (inside and outside Asia) shaken by demographic winter: fewer babies, more deaths and general population decline. In short: a country that continues to lose weight little by little and risks complying UN predictionswhich estimates that by 2100 China will have lost more than half of its population, remaining at the size it had in the late 1950s. What does the data say? That in 2025 the authorities counted 7.92 million of births, 17% less than the previous year. The data leaves two other negative readings: the first is that it suggests that the birth rate increase registered in 2024 was punctual and has not been consolidated over time. After that brief rebound (which some associate to the cultural influence of ‘Year of the Dragon’) the Chinese birth rate has resumed the negative curve that it has been drawing for years. The second negative reading is that the decrease in the number of births has in turn reduced the country’s birth rate, leaving it in 5.63 births per 1,000 people. This is a historic low. A fact that has not been seen since (at least) 1949, year of foundation of the People’s Republic of China. It is about the steepest drop birth rate for the last five years. As AP News recallsChinese authorities do not regularly publish their fertility rate, but their last estimate, from 2020, was 1.3 children per woman. Now that indicator would have dropped to 1. The data is far from the “replacement rate” (2.1), essential to keep a country’s population stable. Click on the image to go to the tweet. Are there more figures? Yes. And they are just as bad. Deaths increased, going from 10.93 million registered in 2024 to 11.31 in 2025. The result of this drop in birth rates and increase in deaths was a natural loss of population (the data does not allude to the migratory effect) that brings China even closer to the projections of the United Nations by the end of the century. The NBS balance sheet reflects the loss of some 3.39 million of Chinese, leaving the country’s total population at around 1,405 million. It is the fourth consecutive year in which the country sees its population reduced, which has caused China to no longer be the most populous nation on the planet: from 2023 that honor India boasts itwhich comfortably exceeds the 1.4 billion of people. Why is it important? Birth rate and census are more than just demographic variables. They also influence the future of the country. The size of the population is directly related, for example, to domestic consumption (key piece in the country’s economy) or the health of its workforce. The demographic winter threatens to subject China to the same social pressures as other countries in Asia and the West, only on a much larger scale. Right now the population over 60 years old represents 23%. If nothing changes, in 2035 that strip will add 400 million of people, just like the entire population of the US and Italy combined. The big question is how that will affect their pension system. At the moment the country already has increased the retirement age. How to change it? That is the other reason why the NBS data is so important and has probably fallen like a bucket of cold water on Beijing. It’s not just about fewer babies being born and population being lost, it’s that the Government has been looking for a way to avoid it for some time… without success, at least until now. As far as birth rates are concerned, it seems to have hit the same rock as other neighboring nations that face a similar challenge, like japan either South Korea. What have you tried? Of everything. And without much success. Despite the billions of dollars invested in child care programs, the facilities offered to those considering becoming parents (from subsidies to medical attention) and efforts to form new couplesthe birth rate continues without increasing. And the Chinese authorities have gone to the extreme of go door to door encouraging women to be mothers. The reason? Beyond the influence of ‘one child’ policy (abandoned a decade ago) there are those who point to cultural changes and the high cost that (despite everything) parenthood entails in China. A 2024 report from the YuWan Population Research Institute in fact concluded that China is one of the most expensive places to raise children (especially if we talk about cities), even more than in Japan or the United States in relative terms. The study addressed both direct and opportunity costs. Image | Peijia Li (Unsplash) In Xataka | China knows that its population is going to collapse but it already has a long-term plan to solve it. Of course, thanks to AI

China has just resolved one of the biggest doubts about going to Mars with the birth of six space mice

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For years, the great doubt of space biology It has not been whether we can have tomatoes and lettuce in orbit to be able to populate other planets, but whether our bodies will remain functional after returning from the vacuum of space. Something that above all interests us in order to reproduce. And in order to solve it, China sent a mouse who was in the Tiangong station to see if she was later capable of having babies and if they came with any serious alteration. Some babies for history. The result of this trip to Tiangong Station The truth is that it has been a successsince on December 10, 2025, a laboratory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) witnessed an apparently everyday but scientifically extraordinary event: the birth of nine baby mice. The special thing, logically, was not the birth, but the fact that his mother had been in space for several weeks (although with some problems) subjected to microgravity and cosmic radiation. Now, six of these babies have survived and are growing normally. It was not without incident. The experiment was a priori quite simple: launch four mice (two males and two females) into space on October 31 and leave them there for two weeks. All this accompanied by adequate food for the duration of the mission. But in the end there were major problems that forced extend the stay in space. And this was a huge inconvenience, since the critical shortage of solid food for the mice could literally cause the mice to die and the mission to be a disaster. And that is why on Earth they began to look for the most suitable food to feed these animals and the result was liquid soy milk, which was the only thing available at the station. Completely monitored. In order to have good traceability of what the mice do in space, scientists kept the mice monitored with artificial intelligence at all times. In this way, it was possible to know at the moment what they ate and even the stress patterns they presented, circadian rhythms and possible anomalies in real time. And everything was taken care of in detail, to the point that the soy milk was supplied with a negative pressure pumping system to prevent liquid bubbles from floating around the cabin. The progression. Once this problem was resolved, on November 14, 2025, the animals returned to earth and natural conception occurred. The result was that 9 calves were born and only six survived in good health. The problem of microgravity. Until this experiment, there was a well-founded fear in the scientific community: that ionizing radiation and the absence of gravity would “break” something in the hormonal axis or in the integrity of the DNA of the gametes. Something that would prevent us from reproducing normally, which would prevent, for example, the colonization of Mars. Precisely, cosmic radiation acts as a shower of high-energy particles that can cause double-strand breaks in DNA. On Earth, our atmosphere protects us, but at 400 km altitude, mice (and humans) are exposed to a much higher dose. Researcher Wang Hongmei highlights that the fact that the offspring are viable suggests that the cellular repair mechanisms of mammals are capable of compensating for the damage suffered during short-duration flights. A competition. As with everything related to space, there is a great rivalry between the United States and China. In this way, if we look back we see that China He had already managed to partially develop mouse embryos in space in 2020. Subsequently, NASA in 2019 conducted researchers on the International Space Station to analyze the bone density loss and muscle in space. What’s next. The experiment does not end with childbirth. Now, scientists monitor what they call “second-generation effects.” The aim is to determine if these six mice will develop health problems in the medium term or if their fertility will be affected when they reach maturity. In this way, if these mice do not present infertility, we can see that space travel is not a sentence of sterility. China’s next big step will be to attempt the reproductive cycle in orbit: conception, gestation and birth without setting foot on Earth. Something that will be fundamental for to be able to understand if humans in space can have some kind of possibility of reproducing without the protection of our beloved atmosphere. Images | Frenjamin Benklin POT In Xataka | Thinking that we are alone in the universe is arrogant. The question is why the aliens haven’t contacted us yet

China decided to privatize its daycare centers in the 1980s. Unknowingly, it was creating its enormous birth crisis.

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Not long ago, China had an excess birth problem. For more than three decades, the one child policy stopped the rapid growth of the population, but now its problem is just the opposite. The demographic crisis has turned around and Chinese population is plummeting. The government has launched plans to encourage births and its latest idea is to improve critical infrastructure. Target: daycare centers. They tell it in South China Morning PostChina is reviewing what will be the first law regulating the child care services sector. The measures will focus on children under three years of age, with the aim of building a society “fertility-friendly”. Among its key measures are improving the quality of the service, ensuring that professionals have the necessary qualifications for the position and expanding the offer of more affordable childcare, which will reduce the cost of parenting. Who takes care of the children. China is encouraging couples to have children through different measures and daycare centers were one of the key aspects to improve. Since the 80s, The state stopped offering public daycares, shifting the burden of care to families. Society adapted in the most predictable way: that the grandparents were the ones to take care of the children (something that it doesn’t always turn out well) or that the woman reduced her hours to take care of the care. A question of money. The lack of regulation has caused the supply of affordable daycare centers to be scarce and with insufficiently qualified professionals. Quality daycare was a luxury available to a few, while for less well-off families it is a last resort. The new law seeks to promote the creation of new state centers at more affordable prices. and trust. The scandals over cases of abuse in Chinese daycares are well known inside and outside their borders, and have also been given cases of abuse by babysitters. If, in addition to the fact that it is an expensive service, we add the problem of lack of trust, it is not surprising that care in the early years ends up being a deterrent factor for many families. In 2021, only 5.5% of Chinese children under three years old were in daycarea figure that contrasts with the 88% of schooling from 3 to 6 years old. Other measures. Since the end of the one-child policy in 2015, the government has implemented several plans to correct the declining birth rate curve. Along with births, marriages also declined, so it was proposed teach marriage and love classes and even be a kind of matchmaker for help young people find a partner. His last measure is one of the most striking: put a special tax on condoms. Image | note thanun in Unsplash In Xataka | If the question is how to reactivate birth rates, China believes it has the answer: finance painless births

The origin of December 25 is in an obscure third century antipope obsessed with the birth of Christ

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For years, we have repeated that Christmas is an invention. Not only does the Bible not specify that Jesus was born on December 25, it is that It is implausible that it was on that date. The gospels themselves detail that there were shepherds tending flocks outdoors (something unlikely in the Decembers of the time in Bethlehem), but the idea that the Romans were going to take a census on those dates is almost delirious. For this reason, we have repeated over and over again, the most reasonable explanation is that during the 4th century, the Church set the birth of Christ on December 25 to make it coincide (and in the process ‘Christianize’) the pagan festivities of Sol Invictus and Saturnalia. The only problem is that the latest available evidence goes in another direction: that of an obscure third century antipope who, obsessed with making a chronology of the scriptures, arrived at the date of the 25th independently. This is the story of how Hippolytus of Rome invented Christmas. The myth of the Christianization of Roman festivals Hail, Caesar! Io, Saturnalia! by Lawrence Alma-Tadema But let’s start by reviewing the best-known theory and seeing why some authors They have started to doubt them. As is often read on the Internet, this theory tells us that there is nothing coincidental about the December 25 election. On that date there was already a birthday, that of the “Unconquered Sun” (which would be the winter solstice for the Romans) and the Church, which during the 4th century struggled to — and would succeed — to become the official religion of the Empire, would have taken advantage of the pull of the pagan festival to place Christmas there. And the theory makes sense. However, it has a big problem; does not really resolve the question at hand: why 25? As explained Thomas C. Schmidta researcher at Princeton University, indeed the Roman Saturnalia fell on those dates, but not on that date. Certainly, it is difficult to be conclusive when we talk about that historical period, but everything seems to indicate that the strong day of Saturnalia fell closer to the 17th than to the 25th. In fact, if this approximation is true, we could not even say that it is the end of the ‘sigilarias’ (the celebrations – of a week – that followed the birth of the Unconquered Sun). Other festivities such as the Kalends (which were already celebrated in January) or the brumals (the solstice festival) do not fit well with the date in question either. That is to say, the idea that these Roman festivals are the origin of Christmas is, as I say, suggestive; but it still does not provide a convincing explanation as to why the Church chose the 25th. To answer that question we have to dig a little deeper. Since when is Christmas celebrated in “Christmas”? As says Schmidt.the first historical reference to December 25 as the day of the “birth of Christ in Bethlehem of Judea” can be found within the Filócalo Calendarin a document dated 336. It is a curious fact. And, although it is not something that explains the central issue of our question (the reason for December 25), it does give us a time frame: it tells us where to look for that explanation because, for practical purposes, we can assume that during the 4th century the festival was already relatively consolidated. That is, you would have to search a little before. Specifically to 222. In that year it is dated a statue of Hippolytus from Rome found in 1551 near the Via Tiburtina. The interesting thing about the statue is that, among its many inscriptions, it includes a lunar tablet that is kept today in the Vatican Library. Who is Hippolytus of Rome and what does he have to do with all this? Adoration of the Shepherds, by Gerard van Honthorst Hippolytus of Rome is a very multifaceted figure. Considered one of the great theologians and preachers of his time (in fact, Origen can be considered his disciple in some respects), he led a schism in 217 that led him to distance himself from the Church for a decade. He is, at the same time, the first antipope in history and a saint who, according to what is said, died martyred 235: he is, in fact, the only antipope canonized to this day. Well, we know that already in 220 after Christ, Hippolytus (in a commentary on the book of Daniel) defended that “The first coming of our Lord, in Bethlehem, was on Wednesday, December 25.” However, we also know that this text is manipulated. There are several versions with modified dates: among them, some that explain that the birth was in March or April. And the truth is that if Jesus was born in April many of our problems would be solved suddenly. However, looking only at the texts, it is not clear. That’s where the statue comes in. Because in the lunar table of the inscriptions, all past and future Easters appear calculated and, along with them, two key notes for us: the original Good Friday (which fell on March 25) and the “genesis” of the Lord (the year 2 AD) which fell on April 2. In the year 235, in a very ambitious work in which he traced the complete chronology of creation, Hippolytus It advanced that origin to March 25 for the simple (and, seen from today, absurd) reason that that was the date on which, according to their data, the world had been created. The true “genesis” of Christmas Paolo de Matteis But what does all this have to do with December 25? The answer is in the statue although I have overlooked it: specifically, in the word “genesis.” Because what is the “genesis” of a person? His birth or his conception? While it would be better for us if it were his birth (because it would fit with what the Bible says about Christmas), … Read more

the map that shows the distribution of world birth rates

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In Brilliant Maps we can find a multitude of very interesting maps and infographics that allow us to obtain context about demographics, culture, and curiosities at a global level. In one of your latest maps shows us the chances of a baby being born on each continent during 2026. The data, based on 2023 birth figures from Our World In Datareveal that it is in Asia and Africa where more than 80% of all births on the planet are concentrated. Specifically, if you were born in 2026, you would have many chances to be Indian. The geography of global birth rates. Of the approximately 132 million babies that will be born in 2026, almost half will be born in Asia (49.7%), followed by Africa with 34.9%. These two regions accumulate 111.7 million births, while the rest of the continents share only the remaining 15.4%. Europe, with only 6.3 million births, represents only 4.8% of the world total. A figure that contrasts with the more than 140 million births annually that were recorded just a few years ago. India leads the ranking by country. The Asian country tops the list with 23.2 million expected births, far ahead of China (8.9 million) and Nigeria (7.5 million). These three countries concentrate almost 30% of all global births. The data from China is especially striking, and it is that just a few years ago, the Asian giant recorded 16 million births annually, which shows the impact of its demographic crisis. Five other African or Asian countries appear among the top ten: Pakistan, Indonesia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia and Bangladesh, while Brazil completes the top ten with 2.6 million expected births. On the other hand, it is worth noting that the United States occupies eighth place with more than 3.6 million births. Spain, touching the top 50. Europe has the lowest birth rates in relative terms of all continents, only ahead of Oceania and North America in absolute numbers. Continent fertility rates remain below replacement level since the 70sa phenomenon that has now spread to practically the entire planet. Spain will register approximately 336,821 births in 2026, ranking 51st in the world, behind Italy (384,627) and France (638,891), but ahead of Poland (317,916). Germany leads Western Europe with 719,249 births, while the United Kingdom reaches 688,388. Nigeria, the African exception. The African country stands out for its position in third place in the world, far ahead of what its economic size might suggest. Your birth rate almost double the world averagea phenomenon linked to factors such as limited access to education for women and a developing economy. Africa will take over in 2100. The projection for the end of the century marks a radical change in the global demographic distribution. According to the dataAfrica will go from the current 34.9% to 48% of world births, becoming the continent with the highest birth rate. Asia, on the other hand, would decrease to 38.17%. And Europe would fall to 4.49%, consolidating its demographic decline. These estimates suggest that more than half of the world’s babies will be born in Africa within 75 years. World population. According to projections According to The Lancet, the world population will reach its peak in the 2060s with 9.7 billion people, and then decline to 8.8 billion in 2100. There are many reasons that can explain this exaggerated demographic change, such as increasing global wealth, access to education, urbanization or changes in gender roles. Some researchers, such as the economist Claudia Goldin, they point to a mismatch between the desires of men and women regarding parenting as a determining factor, pointing out that as long as social structures do not facilitate cooperation in parenting, rates will continue to fall. In Xataka | If you have enough money you can buy a “golden passport”: this map shows the juiciest

Finland has realized that its welfare state is not enough to avoid the birth crisis. Now look for how to stop it

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The world has been looking at the Nordic countries for decades with a mixture of admiration and envy for their model of social welfare. A clear example is Finland, a benchmark in education, aids to motherhood and spent in social benefits. None of this, however, has prevented him from seeing how his birth rate it contracts little by little. In fact, the fall has been so forceful since 2010 and its rate is at such low levels that the Government has decided to hands to work. Now you have a diagnosis… and a formula with 20 ingredients. What does the data say? That Finland has a birth problem. A particularly complex one. The statistical basis The World Bank shows that its birth rate has plummeted over the last six decades, going from 2.7 during the baby boom to 1.3 in 2023. The decline was particularly sharp between the 1960s and 1970s, followed an oscillating curve until the last decade and accelerated again towards 2010. latest data of Macrotrends show a slight recovery, but the rate still remains far from past values. Why is it important? Because it shows that Finland has a problem, one recognized without half measures by the Government itself. “Finland’s birth rate has been declining rapidly over the past 15 years. In 2024 the country’s total fertility rate became as low as 1.25,” recognized last March the Ministry of Social Affairs, which admits that although Finland is not the only country dealing with this challenge, the collapse there has been “exceptionally rapid” in the last decade and a half and threatens to become an economic and social challenge. “Finland’s rate has fallen to a historic low and the decline has been more pronounced than in the other Nordic countries. There is a considerable gap between the ideal number and the actual average number of children. It is essential to find solutions to reduce the gap,” advocated in spring the Minister of Social Security, Sanni Grahm-Laasonen. In 2023 the indicators of the neighbors Norway and Sweden there were around 1.4 children on average per woman, also far from the replacement rate that allows countries to stay away from immigration. Why is the birth rate falling? That’s the million dollar question. And the one that the Finnish authorities did a while ago. To answer it in 2024 the Government commissioned a report which had to clarify the factors that hinder the country’s demographic engine and (just as important) explore possible solutions. The task was relevant because, as the Executive assures, in Finland there is “a big difference” between the number of children that couples want to have and those they have. “Studies show that Finnish family policy has favored both well-being and birth rates and continues to play an important role. However, the current decline is mainly due to the fall in the number of first births and the increase in the proportion of childless people,” reflect Professor Anna Rotkirch, from Väestöliitto (the Finnish Family Federation), one of the experts who participated in the preparation of the birth report. Did you identify the causes? Yes. And no. The Government quote somebut he also recognizes that there is no “clear reason” that alone explains the decline in birth rates. “Therefore there are no easy solutions to stop it,” the Ministry of Health resigns itself before listing some factors that come into play, such as cultural changes, unstable relationships, health, the situation of the labor market and income or the problems of reconciling professional life and parenting. The NPR organization was recently one step further and interviewed experts and young Finns to find out how they approached parenthood. Poa Pohjola and Wilhelm Bomberg, aged 38 and 35, are the first ones he cites in his analysis: the couple has been together for about three years and last July they had their first baby, although Pohjola admits that not so long ago he believed he would never have children. “It seemed impossible to me,” the woman confesses. His case is paradigmatic because it agrees with a phenomenon that Finnish researchers have observed and can be extended to many other countries, including Spain: delayed maternity and the increase in people who directly choose not to have children. In the case of Finland this has led to a fertility rate slightly lower to that of the EU average and nations such as Iceland, Denmark, Sweden or Norway. Does it matter beyond Finland? Yes. And it matters because Finland offers a particularly interesting case study. As remember Liisa Siika-ahofrom the working group of the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, “in Finland benefits and services for families are relatively good.” In fact the Nordic countries they usually stand out precisely because of the facilities they provide for having offspring. Specifically Finland does it in aspects such as incentives, education and paid leave. “We can no longer claim that our good family policies explain the good fertility of the Nordic countries,” points out to NPR Annelie Miettinen, from the state agency Kela. “What baffles researchers is how this can be true, because all of these countries are relatively good at offering family support,” Miettinen said, “but there are really no good explanations for today’s very low fertility rates.” Just as it happens in Spain if the country is managing to weather the demographic storm is basically thanks to the immigration flow. How to solve it? A few months ago the Government made public a report on the topic that includes twenty proposals focused on the family and birth rate, all based on the premise that the commitment to early childhood education, family leave and economic support will boost birth rates. Until it is confirmed, the Health Department itself remains cautious. “In Finland the benefits and services for families are relatively good. This means that there are no areas where simple changes can be made,” takes on Sikka-aho. “However, all systems require maintenance and that is what many of our proposals address. It is unlikely that … Read more

In full birth crisis, Japan faces an extra challenge in 2026: a superstition

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Japan is a country with several calendars. The Western, or Gregorian, is common in the Asian country, which also has its own calendar, based on the “Eras”, the reign periods of its emperors. But in the culture of the country there is still the embers of another calendar, the one based on the traditional Chinese calendar. In 2026 we can verify to what extent this embers is still alive in the Japanese archipelago. To understand why we have to go a complete cycle behind, the year 1966. That year Japan experienced A significant phenomenon: a Fall marked in birthan abrupt contrast with the historical series. If in 1965 around 1.82 million children were born, in 1966 the figure was 1.36 million, 25% less, according to Explain Japan Times. The births were immediately recovered: in 1967 they rolled 1.94 million. The collapse in birth can also be seen in the Japanese health ministry data. As explained by the international agency, the fertility rate went from 2.14 in 1965 to 1.58 in 1966, to “bounce” up to 2.23 the following year. The data was not the result of a statistical anomaly or a disaster, neither natural nor created by the human being. We can see this reflected in an increase in induced abortions in the country, which was recorded A study Posted in 1974 in the magazine Annals of Human Biology. It was the fault of a superstition. The year 1966 corresponded (approximately) to the year of the horse of fire in the cycle on which the traditional Chinese calendar is based. The calendar based on the sexagesimal cycle used in some Asian countries relates each of the 60 years of its cycle with one of Twelve animals (which includes the rat, the tiger, the dragon and also the horse), and one of five elements (wood, fire, earth, metal and water). And what is special for the year Hinoeuma? According to Japanese superstition, women born during the Fire horse year They will kill their husbands or, according to translations, will be at least the cause of the death of their spouses. This would have taken many couples of childbearing age to avoid pregnancy (or even interrupt), at a time when, as Emi Suzuki and Haruna Kashiwase explain in An article For him Data Blog of the World Bank, there was no possibility of a selective abortion depending on sex. Another important detail mentioned in its article is that the phenomenon occurred more marked in rural Japan and not so much in the urban context, which reflects the greatest follow -up that this type of superstitions used to have in the rural world. 60 years of change 60 years is a long time and Japanese society is no longer the one. Will something be repeated again similar in 2026? There are two reasons why it can be suspected that, if the fall in birth rate occurs, this will be of a minor magnitude of experienced in 66. The first reason is in the slightest weight that today has the superstitious in society. Japan lived an abrupt transition series between the end of the EDO era and the present. One of the most vertiginous progress is the one that led a country ravaged by war to become a worldwide technological innovation pole. 1966 It can be seen as a year of transition in this context, 2026 not so much. In any case, the peculiar relationship between Japanese tradition and modernity is often difficult to understand from the western point of view, so it is not convenient to venture into this direction. However, there is another fact that takes us away from that year 1966: 1.15. We said at the beginning that between 1965 and 1966 the Japanese fertility rate went from 2.1 to 1.6. The fall associated with the year Hinoeuma It was punctual and was reversed the following year, but if we looked at the set of the Historical data we see that it is a small detour in a curve with A marked trend: Japan He runs out of birth progressively. According to data from the Japanese Ministry of Health cited by Suzuki and Kashiwasethe Japanese fertility rate was descending throughout the second half of the twentieth century, first quickly and then slower. In 1989 the birth rate would be located again in 1.58 and has not been recovered or expected to do so. It was known as he “shock of 1.57 “ When the rate fell below the year Hinoeuma. Today the rate It is already 1.15. A few years before, in 1987, Japan celebrated a kind of “Fiesta de Quintos”, a celebration in honor of the generation that had turned 20 in the previous months, those born in Hinoeuma. The newspaper The New York Times It echoed of that celebration and superstition that had diminished the generation held that year. Then it seemed clear that the “fifths” of 86 would be the smallest promotion in history, but they would only be for a short time. In Xataka | While the population of Japan sinks irremediably, Tokyo grows. There is an explanation: Ikkyoku Shūchū Image | Evgeny Tchebotarev

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