This year’s 5000th baby was born last Friday at the Daniel de Matos maternity hospital, in Coimbra. The increase is also explained by births that took place outside the area of residence due to the closure of several services.
Rana was born on December 20th. She is the third daughter of a couple, who already have another girl and a boy, and has lived in the city for almost three years. The mother had no idea how many babies were born here this year and what it meant for the birth rate in the region and the country.
More boys and girls like we haven’t seen since 2012. From then on, there were never again so many births in the two maternity hospitals in Coimbra in a single year. Even though after the pandemic there was a slight increase. But there are other reasons that helped the number of babies grow so much by 2024.
“There are several reasons that justify this increase in birth rates. There are more second children, we also have more births from people who come from other hospitals that are closed. They come to be born in Coimbra because they cannot be born in their places of residence. There also seems to be a slight increase in the desire to have children”, explains Teresa Almeida Santos, Director of the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at ULS in Coimbra.
After Rana, more than 40 babies. If this pace continues, the year could end with around 5100 babies born in Coimbra.
