China’s population falls for second straight year amid low birthrate

China’s National Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday published data that showed the nation’s death rate rose last year to the highest level since 1974, near the end of the Cultural Revolution. About 11.1 million people died in China in 2023, around 690,000 more than in the previous year. The country’s birthrate fell nearly six percent, leaving China with about 2 million fewer people than in 2022. India surpassed China last year as the world’s most populous country when China’s population dropped for the first time in six decades.

What has contributed to the decline? China experienced a wave of deaths after it abruptly lifted its “zero-Covid” restrictions in late 2022. In February 2023, China reported that nearly 80,000 people had died since lockdown measures ended, but the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated the total could be as high as 1.4 million. Beijing has also struggled to encourage families to have more children after ending the one-child policy in 2015. It adopted a three-child policy in 2021.

Dig deeper: Read Chiara Lamberti’s report in WORLD Magazine about why having children is countercultural in Italy.