Health
Americans are having fewer babies as birth rate hits historic low, CDC reveals
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that the birth rate in America has dropped to a historic low, decreasing by 3% since 2022.
The rate has been on a steady decline since 2014, except for a brief 1% increase from 2020 to 2021.
In recent years, the priorities of young Americans have been changing, including the desire to have children, the data suggests.
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Experts say this drop-off could be caused by many factors — including a heightened focus on career goals, the cost of raising children, a priority on personal liberty and mental health, the fear of an uncertain future and growing fertility concerns.
The birth rate has dropped to a historic low, decreasing by 3% since 2022, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in April. (iStock)
Career comes first?
Kyle Elliott, a career coach and job search expert based in Santa Barbara, California, told Fox News Digital about a lack of interest in having children among working professionals.
“I am seeing a huge increase in the focus of careers among Americans,” he said.
“In the past, there were certain expectations in place — now, the path isn’t as predictable or expected.”
“They’re recognizing that it’s more challenging to balance work and life because their careers are taking up more time.”
Many Americans are working 50 to 60 hours per week, according to Elliott.
“Trying to balance that is a lot more difficult than it was 20, 10 or even five years ago,” he said.
Many Americans today are working 50 to 60 hours per week, which makes having children nearly impossible, one expert suggested. (iStock)
Individuals who work extended hours are more likely to meet their career goals and earn more money, he said — so many find it “helpful” to forgo parenting commitments.
Company policies for parental leave and child care also come into play, Elliott said.
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While some American businesses have improved accommodations for new parents, the U.S. is “still far behind compared to other countries,” he said.
When employees return from maternity or paternity leave, they’re often still responsible for child care, Elliott noted, which can be “really difficult to balance.”
To recruit and retain employees, one expert suggested that companies should continue providing thoughtful accommodations for families. (iStock)
“I think it would benefit both the employee and the employer if organizations provided more accommodations, whether that’s child care or additional leave or more flexibility, such as remote work or work from anywhere,” he said.
“I think there’s a lot of opportunity to better support parents,” he said, expressing his professional opinion.
Cost of childrearing
The cost of having a child can be daunting for some young Americans, as inflation remains high in many U.S. states, the Labor Department has reported.
A middle-income married couple with two children can expect to pay about $306,924 to raise a child born in 2023, according to data from Credit Karma.
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This estimate is based on a 2017 U.S. Department of Agriculture study.
Cost factors include housing (about 30% of total expenses), food, child care and education, transportation, health care, clothing and other items.
Day care alone could cost up to $17,000 per year in some states, according to 2023 data from the U.S. Department of Labor.
The cost of child care has become “astronomical,” one expert said. (iStock)
There could also be the added cost of saving for the child’s future, including college planning.
Dr. Michele Borba, a California-based educational psychologist and parenting expert, agreed that finances are a “huge factor” in terms of two working parents deciding to have a baby.
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“The cost of child care is unbelievably astronomical, and it’s unaffordable for a lot of parents,” she told Fox News Digital.
Years ago, “you had a nuclear family, or you had a mom who lived next door … and a lot of times, [people] don’t have that” now.
Changing culture and politics
The American family unit has shifted from earlier generations, as many couples are choosing to get married at older ages and limit the number of kids they have, if any, experts say.
Borba, author of “Thrivers: The Surprising Reasons Why Some Kids Struggle and Others Shine,” emphasized an increased focus on mental health and the need for parents to be mentally strong to raise a child.
“We’re seeing not only a halt in pregnancies, but a halt in larger families,” one psychologist said about today’s parenting situation. (iStock)
Many Americans do not have a secure support system to help raise a child, the psychologist noted, and single parenting is “even harder” for unmarried individuals.
A desire for personal freedom can also play a role in a decision not to have children, she noted.
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Jonathan Alpert, a psychotherapist and author based in New York City, said he believes politics has played a role in people’s decisions to have children or not.
“Patients often cite their reasons as, ‘I don’t want to add to the carbon footprint’ or ‘I don’t want to contribute to overpopulation,’ while others feel great insecurity about the state of the world and say, ‘The world is too dangerous of a place to raise a child,’” he told Fox News Digital.
Parents are often more stressed than their own children, one psychologist noted. (iStock)
Among those “more moderate” politically, Alpert said, “they worry about what it would be like to raise a kid in the climate of pronouns, boys competing in girls’ sports, and boys and girls sharing locker rooms.”
Other people simply don’t feel the pressure to have kids as people once did, the psychologist noted.
“In the past, there were certain expectations in place — go to school, meet someone, get married, have kids. Now, the path isn’t as predictable or expected.”
Fear of the unknown
Many adults are also burdened by feelings of uncertainty about the future, Borba said, which can result in a “doom and gloom” perspective when considering whether to bring a human being into the world.
Some parents may ask themselves, “Is this the right kind of place to have a child?” or “Should I bring a human into this world when I don’t feel secure myself?”
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Parenting “isn’t as relaxed” as it used to be decades ago, when parents took more of a hands-off approach and there was less emphasis on accelerated development and hyper-safety, according to Borba.
Parenting “isn’t as relaxed” as it used to be decades ago, one expert said. (iStock)
Kids in previous generations had “a lot more free time, a lot more play,” Borba said.
“Those are things that aren’t part of our kids’ world right now, unfortunately. A lot of [prospective] parents are growing up in a fear-based world, and that’s impacting their decisions.”
Fertility obstacles
The chances of a woman experiencing fertility and pregnancy problems can be another deterrent to having children.
That’s according to Dr. Jillian LoPiano, a Miami-based OB-GYN and chief health officer at the reproductive telehealth platform Wisp, who told Fox News Digital that the health and cost implications of childbirth could cause couples to decide against becoming parents.
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The U.S. is currently experiencing a maternal mortality crisis, LoPiano said.
In 2021, the maternal death rate was 32 out of 100,000 births, which reportedly doubles and triples the current rates in other similarly resourced countries.
The Caesarean delivery rate increased for the fourth year in a row, according to CDC data from 2023. (iStock)
This could be due to the increase in maternal age, chronic health conditions and pregnancy-related health conditions that can appear at an “extreme age spectrum,” LoPiano said.
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“Lack of access to adequate prenatal care, health care costs and restrictive reproductive health care laws all contribute to poor outcomes,” she said.
Socioeconomic factors and other insecurities also play a role in the declining birth rate, LoPiano told Fox News Digital.
‘Should I have a baby?’
For couples who are on the fence about having a child, Borba encouraged them to use their best judgment.
“Nobody knows yourself better,” she said. “In the end, you know who you are and what you can give, so make the decision based on what’s best for your family and your child.”
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Borba suggested writing down the reasons in a journal and leaning on a trusted support system.
“If you want to stick to a decision, you need to be firm and understand your ‘why,’ which means you need to do a little reflective measure,” she advised.
“In the end, you know who you are and what you can give, so make the decision based on what’s best for your family and your child,” one psychologist said. (iStock)
Borba also emphasized the importance of being on the same page as your partner when it comes to having children.
If mental health is the main concern, she suggested seeking help from a provider who can help clarify the decision.
Long-term effects
Overall, Alpert said, it is natural for birth rates to “ebb and flow” over time.
“There’s probably no reason to be alarmed [by today’s declining birth rates],” he told Fox News Digital.
“A lot of [prospective] parents are growing up in a fear-based world, and that’s impacting their decisions.”
“That said, if there’s a significant decline, the proportion of the elderly population would increase relative to births, which could strain the health care system as more resources are put into medical care for the aging population.”
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There would also be fewer people entering the workforce and less spending, Alpert added — resulting in slower economic growth and potentially adversely affecting the Social Security system.
FOX Business’ Megan Henney contributed to this report.
Over the two and a half years following the 2022 rollout of the 988 national suicide prevention hotline, the rate of suicides among young people in the United States dropped 11 percent below projections, decreasing most sharply in states with a higher volume of answered 988 calls, a new study has found.
The findings, published today as a research letter in JAMA, compared suicide deaths from July 2022 to December 2024 with sophisticated mathematical projections that were based on historical trends. This yielded good news, with 4,372 fewer suicides of adolescents and young adults, ages 15 to 34, than had been projected.
To ensure that the decline was related to the use of the hotline, researchers at Harvard Medical School teased out the trends in states with high and low usage of the hotline. The findings were striking: The 10 states with the largest increases in 988 calls experienced an 18.2 percent reduction in observed suicides compared with expected suicides; in the 10 states with the lowest uptake, the reduction was smaller, 10.6 percent.
The results suggest that the government’s investment in the 988 rollout has translated into “a measurable reduction of deaths,” said Dr. Vishal Patel, a resident physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and one of the authors of the study.
“What our study has added,” he said, “is evidence for the deeper benefit of the program, and that is, that at the population level, among young people at least, suicide mortality is lower than it would have been without the program.”
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He added, “The implication of that is that sustained funding for this program matters.”
The United States rolled out the three-digit hotline with bipartisan support in July 2022, replacing a 10-digit hotline number, and augmented it with a $1.5 billion investment in crisis center capacity. Since its inception, the service has fielded more than 25 million contacts, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. The agency has asked Congress for $534.6 million to fund the program for 2027.
Last summer, the Trump administration terminated one element of the hotline, the Press 3 option for L.G.B.T.Q.+ callers. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration said that the Press 3 option was being discontinued because it had exhausted its funding from Congress and that the hotline would “focus on serving all help seekers.”
But advocacy groups and policymakers protested the decision, and in testimony before the Senate on Tuesday, the health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., said his agency was planning to restore the Press 3 option.
Dr. Patel said his group had become curious about measuring the program’s effectiveness after Press 3 was eliminated. While call volume and satisfaction surveys suggested that 988 was succeeding, he said, the harder question was, “Did the creation of this 988 program, the transition from the old hotline to this hotline, actually move the needle on suicide mortality?”
Experts said it was difficult to tease out the beneficial effect of 988 from other things that changed in 2022, the year that the new hotline was created. Around that time, suicide prevention programs were being introduced in schools, in faith communities and on social media, but more important, the pandemic was ending.
“We were finally out of this crazy time, and there was a sense of optimism and hope,” said Jonathan B. Singer, a professor of social work at Loyola University Chicago and a co-author of “Suicide in Schools.” He called the downward trend in youth suicides “encouraging, but it is tempered by the fact that we don’t have a good explanation as to why.”
The authors acknowledged that their findings could not account for the influence of social and economic changes, changes in mental health services or public awareness about services.
But they did make comparisons to exclude other possible explanations. The authors looked for similar effects among American adults over 65, who are less likely to use the hotline. In that group, there was a reduction in suicides that exceeded expectations, but it was smaller, at just 4.5 percent.
To ensure the decline in suicides did not reflect a general improvement in young-adult mortality, the researchers tracked cancer deaths, and found there was no change. They also looked at the rates of suicide among young people in England, where no change had been made to the national crisis line in that time period; they found no reduction in youth suicides there.
Hannah Wesolowski, chief advocacy officer for the National Alliance on Mental Illness, said she was persuaded that the hotline had contributed to the improvement in suicide rates, in part because it did not appear among English youths or in older Americans.
“To me, that really helps hone in that this might really be the differentiator,” she said. “We are seeing potentially a pretty significant decline in suicides among young people. For public policy, this is strong evidence to double down on that we are doing.”
Emily Hilliard, a senior press secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services, said H.H.S. and SAMHSA are “committed to ensuring that all Americans have access” the 988 line, which she said “clearly provides lifesaving support, helping millions of people every year.”
If you are having thoughts of suicide, call or text 988 to reach the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline or go to SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for a list of additional resources.
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A highly contagious digestive virus is surging across the U.S., experts warn.
Rotavirus, a double-stranded RNA virus, causes acute gastroenteritis — inflammation of the stomach and intestines — which can lead to severe diarrhea, vomiting, fever and stomach pain.
The virus primarily affects infants and young children, but there have also been outbreaks in elderly populations, such as nursing homes.
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Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that in the week ending April 4, out of 2,329 rotavirus tests, 7.3% were positive for the infection. Last year’s highest infection rate was 6.77% as of the week ending April 19.
Rotavirus, a double-stranded RNA virus, causes acute gastroenteritis — inflammation of the stomach and intestines — which can lead to severe diarrhea, vomiting, fever and stomach pain. (iStock)
“We’re seeing a lot of rotavirus in the wastewater right now,” Dr. Marc Siegel, Fox News senior medical analyst, confirmed to Fox News Digital. “Testing for rotavirus is way down, but the percentage of positive tests is up.”
While the virus typically peaks in the spring, it is not currently slowing down, he noted.
Why cases may be rising
Patricia Pinto-Garcia, M.D., a medical editor at GoodRx who is based in California, said there are several possible reasons for the rotavirus spike.
“Vaccine rates are down overall among young children, as they decreased during COVID,” she told Fox News Digital. “This means there’s a growing number of infants and young children who are vulnerable to infection.”
The rotavirus vaccine series must be completed by the time a child is 8 months old, she noted.
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As a result of the declining vaccinations, herd immunity isn’t protecting vulnerable children, according to Pinto-Garcia. “Children who haven’t finished the vaccine series yet, are too young to get vaccinated, or can’t get the vaccine due to medical illness are more likely to get exposed to the illness because other children aren’t vaccinated,” she said.
Siegel noted that before the vaccine became available, rotavirus resulted in 55,000 to 70,000 in the U.S. per year.
“Vaccine rates are down overall among young children, as they decreased during COVID,” a doctor told Fox News Digital. “This means there’s a growing number of infants and young children who are vulnerable to infection.” (iStock)
“I am concerned that the vaccination rate has been declining over the past seven years and is continuing to decline in the current climate of vaccine skepticism,” he said.
Surveillance methods are also much better than they used to be, Pinto-Garcia noted, which means public health experts are able to pick up and track cases better than ever before.
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“But we see that rotavirus-related healthcare visits are also up, so improved detection is not the only reason we are seeing this spike,” she said.
The COVID pandemic also disrupted the pattern of infections, according to Pinto-Garcia, so it’s “tricky” to compare the current levels against older cycles.
“It’s possible that what we are seeing is still some post-pandemic rebound, but it’s unlikely that this year’s pattern is fully explained by just this factor,” she added.
Transmission and risk
Dr. Zachary Hoy, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Pediatrix Medical Group based in Nashville, Tennessee, often sees young patients with rotavirus.
“Rotavirus is spread via the fecal-oral route, meaning that a person comes into contact with virus droplets from contact with other children or adults, or from contact with objects such as toys that have been contaminated with the virus from someone who is sick,” he told Fox News Digital. “This can lead to outbreaks, especially at schools where many young children share the same toys.”
“It’s possible that what we are seeing is still some post-pandemic rebound, but it’s unlikely that this year’s pattern is fully explained by just this factor.”
Rotavirus is associated with many dehydration cases in the hospital due to the degree of diarrhea, according to Hoy.
In some severe cases, the virus can lead to seizures due to electrolyte imbalances from dehydration and loss of electrolytes in the stool.
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“Younger children do not have the reserves that older children and adults have, so they can become more dehydrated quicker and develop more severe electrolyte imbalances, leading to more severe infections,” Hoy said.
“Patients with problems with their immune systems or on medications that can decrease their immune systems can have more severe and prolonged infections, too.”
Treatment and care
Because rotavirus is a viral infection, antibiotics are not effective against it. There is no specific antiviral treatment for the condition, with doctors typically recommending supportive care.
“The mainstay of treatment is hospitalization for rehydration via intravenous (IV) fluids,” Hoy told Fox News Digital. “Sometimes it can take up to two to three days of IV fluids to help get patients rehydrated.”
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Blood draws are often necessary to evaluate patients’ electrolyte levels, such as sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium, according to the doctor.
“If these electrolyte levels are significantly low, sometimes patients need special IV solutions or individual electrolyte medications,” he added.
“The mainstay of treatment is hospitalization for rehydration via intravenous (IV) fluids,” a doctor told Fox News Digital. (iStock)
Dr. Daniel Park, medical director of the Pediatric Emergency Department at UNC Health in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, noted that most children recover with supportive care, but parents should seek medical attention if a child shows signs of dehydration. Those include decreased urination, lethargy or inability to keep fluids down.
“While rare, rotavirus can be life-threatening in vulnerable populations, especially very young infants or children with underlying medical conditions,” Park told Fox News Digital.
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Prevention strategies
Given the lack of antiviral medications for rotavirus, doctors emphasize the importance of prevention, primarily the vaccine.
There are two rotavirus vaccines – Rotateq (a three-dose series) and Rotarix (a two-dose series). They are given starting at age 2 months as oral drops, not injections, according to Hoy.
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“It’s important to get the rotavirus vaccines on schedule, because these younger infants are at greatest risk if they get rotavirus,” he advised.
Other recommended prevention methods include handwashing with soap and water.
Every day we’re faced with a zillion small choices: Go to sleep early, or watch one more episode of that Netflix drama. Call an old friend to catch up, or cruise social media. Of course, no single action will guarantee a long, healthy life or doom you to an early grave. But those little daily decisions do add up, and over the long term they can make a difference when it comes to both your longevity and your health span, the amount of life spent in relatively good health.
Scroll through this theoretical “day in the life” and select the option that best fits your typical day. Not every situation will apply perfectly, but think about which choice you’d be most likely to make. This isn’t a formal scientific assessment. The goal here isn’t to assign you a “good” or “bad” score, but to help you understand the central factors that shape the way we age and how long we live.
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