Greece is running out of babies. New research from demographer Vyronas Kotzamanis, retired professor at the University o...

Greece is running out of babies. New research from demographer Vyronas Kotzamanis, retired professor at the University of Thessaly and director of the Institute of Demographic Research and Studies, shows the country recorded just 66,700 births in 2024-25, down from 117,700 in 2008-2009 and a long way from the 148,000 births recorded in 1980. That 42% collapse over the last 15 years is sharper than anything Greece experienced in the 1980s, when births fell 31% over a full decade. Kotzamanis traces the root cause to generational fertility, specifically the fact that women born in the late 1950s averaged 2.0 children, while women born around 1985 are averaging fewer than 1.5. The crisis is not spread evenly across the country. Six mainland prefectures including Thesprotia, Grevena, Fthiotida, Kozani, Evrytania, and Florina saw birth declines exceeding 50% between 2009 and 2024. By contrast, six island prefectures saw declines below 30%, with Cyclades and Zakynthos recording drops of less than 15%. The deaths-to-births ratio tells an equally alarming story. In 2009, Greece recorded 92 deaths for every 100 births. By 2024, that figure had doubled to 184 deaths per 100 births. In 17 mainland prefectures, the ratio ranges from 175 to 276. Only a handful of areas, including the Dodecanese, Xanthi, and three Cretan prefectures, still recorded more births than deaths in 2024. The situation is set to worsen. Kotzamanis projects another significant decline of around 15% between 2045 and 2060, when the smaller cohorts born between 2010 and 2029 reach reproductive age. That generation already numbers approximately 450,000 fewer people than the generation born between 1990 and 2009. #Greece #Demographics #GreekCrisis