In 2023, the total fertility rate in children per woman in Armenia stood at 1.9. Between 1960 and 2023, the figure dropped by 2.89, though the decline followed an uneven course rather than a steady trajectory.

The fertility rate of a country is the average number of children that women from that country will have throughout their reproductive years. From 1800 to 1900, Norway's fertility rate fluctuated quite regularly, between 3.9 and 4.9 children per woman, and then in the first half of the twentieth century it declined gradually, falling to 1.9 in 1940. From 1940 until 1970, Norway experienced its 'baby boom' and the fertility rate rose to almost 3 children per woman in this time, before falling again to 1.7 in 1985. From this point onwards, the fertility rate has plateaued, between 1.7 and 1.9, and is expected to be 1.7 in 2020.

The fertility rate of a country is the average number of children that women from that country will have throughout their reproductive years. From 1800 to 1875, Sweden's fertility rate fluctuated quite regularly, rising from 4.1 children per woman in 1800 to it's maximum recorded figure of 5.1 in the early 1820s, and then dropping to 4.2 by 1870. It was at this point that the fertility rate began falling gradually, to just 1.7 births per woman in 1935. Sweden also experienced its own baby boom that lasted from the 1940s to the late 1960s, before falling to 1.6 in 1985. In the past few decades, Sweden's fertility rate has again fluctuated between 1.5 and 2 children per woman, due to varying economic circumstances and migrational factors. In 2020, it is estimated that the fertility rate of Sweden will be 1.9 children per woman.

Abstract

The 2006-07 Sri Lanka Demographic and Health Survey (SLDHS) is the fourth in a series of DHS surveys to be held in Sri Lanka-the first three having been implemented in 1987, 1993, and 2000. Teams visited 2,106 sample points across Sri Lanka and collected data from a nationally representative sample of almost 20,000 households and over 14,700 women age 15-49.

A nationally representative sample of 21,600 housing units was selected for the survey and 19,872 households were enumerated to give district level estimates (excluding Northern Province). Detailed information was collected from all ever-married women aged 15-49 years and about their children below five years at the time of the survey. Within the households interviewed, a total of 15,068 eligible women were identified, of whom 14,692 were successfully interviewed.

The Department of Census and Statistics (DCS) carried out the 2006-07 SLDHS for the Health Sector Development Project (HSDP) of the Ministry of Healthcare and Nutrition, a project funded by the World Bank. The objective of the survey is to provide data needed to monitor and evaluate the impact of population, health, and nutrition programmes implemented by different government agencies. Additionally, it also aims to measure the impact of interventions made under the HSDP towards improving the quality and efficiency of health care services as a whole.

All 25 districts of Sri Lanka were included at the design stage. The final sample has only 20 districts, however, after dropping the 5 districts of the Northern Province (Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Mannar, Vavuniya, and Mullativu), due to the security situation there.

OBJECTIVES

The objective of this report is to publish the final findings of the 2006-07 SLDHS. This final report provides information mainly on background characteristics of respondents, fertility, reproductive health and maternal care, child health, nutrition, women's empowerment, and awareness of HIV/AIDS and prevention. It is expected that the content of this report will satisfy the urgent needs of users of this information.

MAIN RESULTS

FERTILITY Survey results indicate that there has been a slight upturn in the total fertility rate since the 2000 SLDHS. The total fertility rate for Sri Lanka is 2.3, meaning that, if current age-specific fertility rates were to remain unchanged in the future, a woman in Sri Lanka would have an average of 2.3 children by the end of her childbearing period. This is somewhat higher than the total fertility rate of 1.9 measured in the 2000 SLDHS.

Fertility is only slightly lower in urban areas than in rural areas (2.2 and 2.3 children per woman, respectively); however, it is higher in the estate areas (2.5 children per woman). Interpretation of variations in fertility by administrative districts is limited by the small samples in some districts. Nevertheless, results indicate that Galle and Puttalam districts have fertility rates of 2.1 or below, which is at what is known as “replacement level” fertility, i.e., the level that is necessary to maintain population size over time. Differences in fertility by level of women's education and a measure of relative wealth status are minimal.

FAMILY PLANNING According to the survey findings, knowledge of any method of family planning is almost universal in Sri Lanka and there are almost no differences between ever-married and currently married women. Over 90 percent of currently married women have heard about pills, injectables, female sterilization, and the IUD. Eight out of ten respondents know about some traditional method of delaying or avoiding pregnancies.

Although the proportion of currently married women who have heard of at least one method of family planning has been high for some time, knowledge of some specific methods has increased recently. Since 1993, knowledge of implants has increased five-fold-from about 10 percent in 1993 to over 50 percent in 2006-07. Awareness about pill, IUD, injectables, implants, and withdrawal has also increased. On the other hand, awareness of male sterilization has dropped by 14 percentage points.

CHILD HEALTH The study of infant and child mortality is critical for assessment of population and health policies and programmes. Infant and child mortality rates are also regarded as indices reflecting the degree of poverty and deprivation of a population. Survey data show that for the most recent five-year period before the survey, the infant mortality rate is 15 deaths per 1,000 live births and under-five mortality is 21 deaths per 1,000 live births. Thus, one in every 48 Sri Lankan children dies before reaching age five. The neonatal mortality rate is 11 deaths per 1,000 live births and the postneonatal mortality rate is 5 deaths per 1,000 live births. The child mortality rate is 5 deaths per 1,000 children surviving to age one year.

REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH The survey shows that virtually all mothers (99 percent) in Sri Lanka receive antenatal care from a health professional (doctor specialist, doctor, or midwife). The proportion receiving care from a skilled provider is remarkably uniform across all categories for age, residence, district, woman's education, and household wealth quintile. Even in the estate sector, antenatal care usage is at the same high level. Although doctors are the most frequently seen provider (96 percent), women also go to public health midwives often for prenatal care (44 percent).

BREASTFEEDING AND NUTRITION Poor nutritional status is one of the most important health and welfare problems facing Sri Lanka today and particularly affects women and children. The survey data show that 17 percent of children under five are stunted or short for their age, while 15 percent of children under five are wasted or too thin for their height. Overall, 21 percent of children are underweight, which may reflect stunting, wasting, or both. As for women, at the national level, 16 percent of women are considered to be thin (with a body mass index < 18.5); however, only 6 percent of women are considered to be moderately or severely thin.

Poor breastfeeding and infant feeding practices can have adverse consequences for the health and nutritional status of children. Fortunately, breastfeeding in Sri Lanka is universal and generally of fairly long duration; 97 percent of newborns are breastfed within one day after delivery and 76 percent of infants under 6 months are exclusively breastfed, lower than the recommended 100 percent exclusive breastfeeding for children under 6 months. The median duration of any breastfeeding is 33 months in Sri Lanka and the median duration of exclusive breastfeeding is 5 months.

HIV/AIDS The HIV/AIDS pandemic is a serious health concern in the world today because of its high case fatality rate and the lack of a cure. Awareness of AIDS is almost universal among Sri Lankan adults, with 92 percent of ever-married women saying that they have heard about AIDS. Nevertheless, only 22 percent of ever-married women are classified as having “comprehensive knowledge” about AIDS, i.e., knowing that consistent use of condoms and having just one faithful partner can reduce the chance of getting infected, knowing that a healthy-looking person can be infected, and knowing that AIDS cannot be transmitted by sharing food or by mosquito bites. Such a low level of knowledge about AIDS implies that a concerted effort is needed to address misconceptions about HIV transmission. Programs might be focused in the estate sector and especially in Batticaloa, Ampara, and Nuwara Eliya districts where comprehensive knowledge is lowest.

Moreover, a composite indicator on stigma towards HIV-infected people shows that only 8 percent of ever-married women expressed accepting attitudes toward persons living with HIV/AIDS. Overall, only about one- half of ever-married women age 15-49 years know where to get an HIV test.

WOMEN'S EMPOWERMENT AND DEMOGRAPHIC AND HEALTH OUTCOMES The 2006-07 SLDHS collected data on women's empowerment, their participation in decisionmaking, and attitudes towards wife beating. Survey results show that more than 90 percent of currently married women, either alone or jointly with their husband, make decisions on how their income is used. However, husbands' control over women's earnings is higher among women with no education (15 percent) than among women with higher education (4 percent).

In Sri Lanka, the husband is usually the main source of household income; two-thirds of women earn less than their husband. Although the majority of women earn less than their husband, almost half have autonomy in decisions about how to spend their earnings.

The survey also collected information on who decides how the husband's cash earnings are spent. The majority of couples (60 percent) make joint decisions on how the husband's cash income is used. More than 1 in 5 women (23 percent) reported that they decide how their husband's earnings are used; another 16 percent of the women reported that their husband mainly decides how his earnings are spent.

Geographic coverage

A nationally representative sample of 21,600 housing units was selected for the survey and 19,872 households were enumerated to give district level estimates (excluding Northern Province).

Analysis unit

• Household
• Women age 15-49
• Children under five

Universe

In principle, the sample was designed to cover private households in the areas sampled. The population residing in institutions and institutional households was excluded. For the detailed individual interview, the eligibility criteria wereall ever-married women aged 15-49 years who slept in the household the previous night and about their children below five years at the

In 2022, the total fertility rate of women in the Philippines aged 15 to 49 years declined from 2.7 children per woman in 2017 to 1.9 children per woman in 2022. The total fertility rate refers to the average number of children that would be born if women survived to the end of their reproductive period.

The fertility rate of a country is the average number of children that women from that country will have throughout their reproductive years. In Germany in 1800, the average woman of childbearing age would have 5.4 children over the course of their lifetime. It remained around this number until the late 1820s, when it then dropped to just under five, which was a long-term effect of the Napoleonic Period in Europe. From this point until the end of the nineteenth century, Germany's fertility rate was rather sporadic, reaching it's lowest point in 1855 with an average of 4.6 births per woman, and it's highest point in 1875 (just after the foundation of the German Empire in 1871), with an average of 5.4 live births per woman. From the beginning of the twentieth century until the end of the Second World War, Germany's fertility rate dropped from around 5 children per woman in 1900, to 1.9 in 1945. The only time where the fertility rate increased was in the inter-war years. Like other countries heavily involved in the Second World War, Germany (both East and West) experienced a Baby Boom from the late 1940s to the late 1960s, however it then dropped to it's lowest point of just 1.3 children per woman by 1995, shortly after the re-unification of Germany. In recent years, Germany's fertility rate has gradually been increasing again, and is expected to reach 1.6 in 2020, its highest rate in over forty years.

In 1900, the region of present-day North Korea had a fertility rate of approximately 6.1 children per woman, meaning a woman born in North Korea in the given year could expect to have just over six children throughout the course of her reproductive years. This rate would remain largely consistent until the 1940s, however, the middle of the century would see dramatic rises and falls in fertility, as Japan's annexation of the Korean peninsula in the Second World War, and the subsequent Korean War in the early-1950s saw large scale socioeconomic turmoil in the peninsula. Because of this, fertility halved to 3.1 between 1940 and 1950, before spiking to 5.1 by the 1960s.

North Korea's fertility rate fluctuated in the decades following these wars, as the country recovered and came to grips with its new structure; while the total fertility rate began upon a more consistent trajectory of decline from the 1980s onwards. In 2020, it is estimated that the average woman born in North Korea can expect to have approximately 1.9 children over the course of their reproductive years.

The fertility rate of a country is the average number of children that women from that country will have throughout their reproductive years. In 1855, New Zealand's women of childbearing age would go on to have approximately 5.3 children on average during their lifetime. Over the course of the next eighty years, the fertility rate would increase to 5.7 in 1870 (due to the continued arrival of settlers to the islands), before decreasing to 2.4 in 1935. During and after the Second World War, from 1935 until the 1970s, New Zealand experienced its 'Baby Boom', where the fertility rate increased to 4.1 births per woman in 1960, before dropping sharply to two births per woman in 1985, and it has remained between 1.9 and 2.2 since then.

The fertility rate in Denmark fluctuated over the past two decades. It peaked at 1.9 children per woman in 2010 but started to decline since then, dropping to 1.5 in 2023. In Europe, Andorra had the lowest fertility rate in 2023. The fertility rate shows the average number of children a woman would give birth to if she lived through her child-bearing years.

Between 2010 and 2023, the fertility rate in Sweden decreased steadily, dropping to 1.5. The fertility rate is defined as the number of children that would be born or are likely to be born to a woman if she lives to the end of her reproductive years. A similar decline was visible for the crude birth rate, which in 2022 was down at 10 births per 1,000 inhabitants.

More immigrants than emigrants

Despite the decreasing fertility- and crude birth rate in Sweden, the population in Sweden continues to grow. More babies are born each year than people dying, which contributes to a growing population. However, the major reason behind the continued population growth is the positive inflow of immigrants. Few people are leaving the country, while many more migrants are arriving in Sweden.

Fertility rate in Europe

Even though the fertility rate in the country decreased over the last 10 years, Sweden had a higher fertility rate than many other countries in Europe in 2023. The Faroe Islands had the highest fertility rate, whereas Andorra had the lowest.

There were almost 695,000 live births recorded in the United Kingdom in 2021, compared with almost 682,000 in the previous year. Between 1887 and 2021, the year with the highest number of live births was 1920, when there were approximately 1.13 million births, while the year with the fewest births was 1977, when there were approximately 657,000 births. Birth rate falls to a historic low in 2020 At 10.2 births per 1,000 people, the birth rate of the United Kingdom in 2020 was at a historic low. After witnessing a twenty-first century high of 12.9 in 2010, the birth rate gradually declined before a sharp decrease was recorded between 2012 and 2013. Although there was a slight uptick in the birth rate in 2021, when there were 10.4 births per 1,000 people, the total fertility rate reached a low of 1.53 births per woman in the same year. As well as falling birth and fertility rates, the average age of mothers has been increasing. In 1991, the average age of mothers at childbirth was 27.7 years, compared with 30.9 years in 2021. UK population reaches 68 million In 2023, the overall population of the United Kingdom reached almost 68.3 million people. Of the four countries that comprise the UK, England has by far the highest population, at 57.7 million, compared with almost 5.5 million in Scotland, 3.2 million in Wales, and 1.9 million in Northern Ireland. These countries are far less densely populated than England, especially when compared to London, which had approximately 5,630 people per square kilometer, compared with just 70 in Scotland. After London, North West England was the second-most densely populated area of the UK, which includes the large metropolitan areas of the cities of Manchester, and Liverpool