Births, Deaths and Marriages in Quarter 2 2011

The CSO today released the Vital Statistics Second Quarter 2011 report.

This report contains upward revisions to the previously published figures for births registered in quarter 3 of 2008, quarter 1 of 2009 and 2010, and also the previously published numbers for deaths registered in quarter 1 of 2010 and 2011. The natural increase and totals for these years are also revised.

The data omissions occurred as a result of a data transmission and download issue, which was recently identified by the Central Statistics Office. Measures have been put in place to avoid any such problem arising again in the future.

Please see http://www.cso.ie/px/pxeirestat/statire/SelectTable/Omrade0.asp?Planguage=0 for more detailed revised tables.

Some of the key points highlighted in the report are as follows:

Births

• There were 18,381 births registered in quarter 2 of 2011, a decrease of 2.5% in the number of births registered in the corresponding quarter of 2010. The quarter 2 2011 total is 20.6% higher than in 2002 when 15,247 babies were registered. See tables 1, 3, 4 and 5.

• Births in the second quarter of 2011 represented an annual birth rate of 16.4 per 1,000 of the population The rate for the corresponding quarter of 2010 was 16.9 per 1,000 of the population and 15.6 per 1,000 of the population in quarter 2 2002.

• Of the 18,381 births, there were 6,013 births registered as outside marriage. This accounted for 33% of all births. Of these, 3,396 births were to unmarried parents with the same address, 18% of all births. The highest percentage of births outside marriage occurred in Limerick City at 47%, while the lowest percentage occurred in Cork County and Galway County, both at 25%.

• The average age of mothers for births registered in quarter 2 2011 was 31.8 years, 0.3 years more than the corresponding figure in quarter 2 2010, 0.7 years more than in quarter 2 2006, and 1.3 years more than in quarter 2 2002. The average age of mothers having their first child in quarter 2 2011 was 29.9 years.

Deaths

• There were 7,277 deaths registered in quarter 2 2011, an increase of 5% in the number of deaths registered in the second quarter of 2010. The quarter 2 2011 total represents a death rate of 6.5 per 1,000 of the population. This compares with 6.2 per 1,000 of the population in 2010 and 7.8 per 1,000 of the population in 2002.

• For those aged 65 and over, the annual death rate was 42.9 per 1,000 of the population (5,618 deaths). This compares with a rate of 42.0 per 1,000 of the population for the corresponding quarter of 2010, an increase of 2.1%. The decrease in this rate since 2002 was 23% (55.7 per 1,000 of the population).

• There were 61 infant deaths registered in quarter 2 2011 giving an infant mortality rate of 3.3 deaths per 1,000 live births. The corresponding rate in quarter 2 2010 was 4.5 per 1,000 live births and was 6.0 per 1,000 live births in quarter 2 2002. The number of neonatal deaths (deaths of infants at ages under 4 weeks) in quarter 2 2011 was 41, 2.2 deaths per 1,000 live births.

• Almost one third (32.3%) of all deaths in the quarter were attributed to circulatory disease (2,351), while a further 30% were attributed to malignant neoplasms (2,198), 12.6% to respiratory diseases (920) and 6% to external causes (434).

Natural Increase

• The natural increase in the population (births minus deaths) for quarter 2 2011 was 11,104. This represents a rate of 9.9 per 1,000 of the population, 0.8 lower than quarter 2 of 2010.

Marriages

• There were 5,025 marriages registered in quarter 2 2011, an increase of 22 from the number of marriages registered in quarter 2 2010 and an increase of 215 from the number registered in the corresponding quarter of 2002.

Vital Statistics Second Quarter 2011 is available on our website www.cso.ie (PDF 174KB)  

For more information contact Sandra Tobin on 021 453 5307 or Maria Crowley on 021 453 5016.

Central Statistics Office                                                              22 February  2012

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