by Linda Straker
- 1,611 live births and 1,273 deaths in 2021
- Increase in births and deaths rose year after Covid-19 was declared global pandemic
- 200 Grenadian deaths categorised as Covid-19 related in 2021
A review of data from the Statistics Division in the Ministry of Economic Development and Planning shows that the highest number of live births and deaths for the 5-year period of 2019 to 2023 was recorded in 2021.
The records, which are available on the central statistics website — a project developed with the assistance of the Government of Canada through the Project for the Regional Advancement of Statistics in the Caribbean — show that there were 1,611 live births and 1,273 deaths.
Before the peak of 1,611 in 2021, the number of live births for 2019 and 2020 were 1,575 and 1,540, respectively, while the number of deaths was 973 for 2019 and 1,033 for 2020.
It’s notable that the increase in births and deaths rose the year after Covid-19 was declared a global pandemic and countries around the world went into lockdown. More than 200 Grenadian deaths were categorised as Covid-19-related in 2021.
Grenada went into lockdown in March 2020. The years of 2020 and 2021 were the Covid-19 years with periodic curfew and restriction of movement of people as part of the Government’s strategy to reduce and control the transmission of Covid-19.
The data shows that the live births began reducing in 2022, the same year that countries returned to normal operations following the Covid-19 pandemic, which is now labelled as endemic. There were 1,469 newborns in 2022 and a further reduction in 2023 as the department recorded 1,380 children born that year. As for deaths, the number for 2022 was 1,136, and in 2023 it was 1,068.
When it comes to the death rate at birth or within 28 days of birth, the data show that there was a gradual reduction from 2020. That year, there were 31 deaths, in 2021 there were 30, in 2022 there were 29, and in 2023 there were 17.
