October births and deaths both up year-on-year
According to data released by the Ministry of the Interior, a total of 1,282 live births were registered in Estonia in October, 615 girls and 667 boys. This is up year-on-year (y-o-y) from 1,141, though less than the number of deaths for October at 1,367, making October the first month in six for deaths to exceed births.
Tallinn city unsurprisingly saw the largest number of births by region at 466. The breakdown of births by county is as follows:
- Harju: 189
- Tartu: 159
- Ida Viru: 116
- Lääne Viru: 64
- Pärnu: 56
- Viljandi: 43
- Võru: 37
- Rapla: 31
- Saare: 22
- Jõgeva: 20
- Põlva: 20
- Järva: 18
- Valga: 18
- Lääne: 13
- Hiiu: 10
27 sets of twins were born in October, nine girls, eight boys and ten mixed pairs.
The most popular girls' names as registered were Lenna, Isabel, Saskia, Emily, Eva, Lisandra, Mia and Nora. Amongst the boys the most popular names were Mattias, Rasmus, Aron, Jaspar, Kaspar, Lukas, Nikita and Sebastian.
Other data
October also saw 393 marriages (up 20 y-o-y) , 60 at registry offices and 27 in churches/places of worship. There were 242 divorces (up from 215 y-o-y), 39 of which were notarised.
1,367 deaths were registered in October, a rise y-o-y from 1,248.
120 people registered new names for all reasons during the month, 34 first names, 77 last names and 9 both first and second names, 68 of whom were women and 52 men.
While the death rate in Estonia has decreased most years since 2008 (from 16,675 to 15,543 in 2017), it has still exceeded the birth rate in every year, though not every month, except 2010; the birth rate also fell most years, from 16,028 in 2008 to 13,784 in 2017, according to Statistics Estonia data.
With births/deaths the gap standing at a few hundred it is likely net immigration levels are such that the overall population continues to rise slightly.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte
