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Italy is Dying: Country’s Birth Rate Drops to its Lowest Level in History
LifeSite News ^ | 2/20/20 | Dorothy Cummings McLean

Posted on 02/22/2020 5:20:41 PM PST by marshmallow

The shrinking population affects the 'very existence of our country,' President Sergio Mattarella warns.

ROME, Italy, February 20, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) ― Italy welcomed its smallest number of newborns in 2019, leading its president to foretell the country’s doom.

“This is a problem that concerns the very existence of our country,” said Sergio Mattarella, 78.

“The fabric of our country is weakening, and everything must be done to counter this phenomenon.”

According to Italy’s national statistics agency, ISTAT, there were only 435,000 births in Italy last year, the lowest number ever recorded in the country, compared with 647,000 deaths.

The number of births was down 5,000 from 2018, and the number of deaths increased by 14,000.

Reuters reported that Italy’s overall population fell by 116,000 to 60.3 million despite the growing number of births to migrants to the country. The news agency also noted that “Italy’s population had risen virtually every year since World War I, hitting a peak in 2015 at 60.8 million, but has since started to decline.”

Life expectancy has increased to 85.3 years for Italian women and 81 years for Italian men. The decrease in births and increase in life expectancy has resulted in an average age of 45.7.

When the low number of Italian births for 2018 was reported, then-interior minister Matteo Salvini said, “We are in a terrible state.”

“This is the real crisis (in Italy), not the bond yield spreads or the economic crisis.”

Italian-American Beverly Stevens, editor of Regina magazine, told LifeSiteNews that the sexual revolution is to blame for the low Italian birth rate.

(Excerpt) Read more at lifesitenews.com ...


TOPICS: Catholic; Current Events; Religion & Culture
KEYWORDS: birthrate; children; europe; italy
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To: marshmallow
This has been going on for decades and has gotten worse. With Angelo and Nunzio preferring to live at home with mamma to watch footie and play video games rather than getting a wife, things won’t be changing anytime soon.

Standard explanation from Italians about this is that having kids is too expensive.

21 posted on 02/22/2020 5:53:49 PM PST by Clemenza
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To: wardaddy

The hottest Italian girls live in Buenos Aires or São Paulo.


22 posted on 02/22/2020 5:54:53 PM PST by Clemenza
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To: wardaddy

What about Gina Lollobrigida?


23 posted on 02/22/2020 5:56:53 PM PST by EvilCapitalist (Pets are no substitute for children.)
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To: Trumpet 1

What are you saying? Birthrate in Mexico is only slightly above replacement level and falling.


24 posted on 02/22/2020 5:57:17 PM PST by Clemenza
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To: wardaddy
Don’t blame us

Your birth rate and your Pope is on you guys


You're correct.

But as I've pointed out here before, it wasn't the Catholics in this country who broke first on the birth control issue; it was the Protestants in the aftermath of the Lambeth Conference. In some sense, it's amazing the Catholics held out for the thirty years they did; knowing how many children they were going to have (two), the Protestants were free to buy bigger homes, a new car every two years, and take bigger vacations.

Unfortunately, keeping up with the Joneses became more important than keeping the Faith, and the Catholics succumbed.

25 posted on 02/22/2020 5:59:53 PM PST by Captain Walker
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To: marshmallow

My son, his wife and their 9 month old daughter were there over Christmas. They said everyone was coming up to them and going crazy over Ellie. They said you didnt see many babies at all.


26 posted on 02/22/2020 6:06:29 PM PST by southernindymom
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To: dsc

Add up all three you get the death of a civilization


27 posted on 02/22/2020 6:07:38 PM PST by gibsonguy
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To: Clemenza

No, Mexico is over-populating like crazy. The government of Mexico will not allow its economy to grow such as to provide for its young person population. Therefore, the young peasants (surplus population) are moving en-mass to the USA to find a better life. If those illegal Migrants were still in Mexico the population of Mexico would be skyrocketing as would be the birth rate.


28 posted on 02/22/2020 6:12:48 PM PST by Trumpet 1 (US Constitution is my guide.)
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To: fatima
When was the last time you heard a Priest at Mass speak about birth control.

Priests should be the last ones lecturing others about sex and birth control.

29 posted on 02/22/2020 6:13:57 PM PST by Jess Kitting
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To: ealgeone

So are you here to talk about Italy’s population decline or just take shots at Catholics? Nevermind. I know what the answer is.


30 posted on 02/22/2020 6:15:41 PM PST by GOP_Party_Animal
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To: FatherofFive

Birth control is just a means, not the cause. Feminism has taught women to disvalue motherhood and to seek a career outside the home. Such a mentality sees a large—or indeed any—family as a distraction from the “real” work that women should be doing. Italy, with the rest of the West, needs to rediscover the the true value of women as women, and again value their roles as wives and mothers in the home.


31 posted on 02/22/2020 6:17:04 PM PST by Petrosius
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To: Trumpet 1

Statistics and truth contradict everything you say. Mexico had a high birthrate in decades past, but not anymore. That is why you don’t see the high influx of Mexicans that you did in years past.:

https://www.csis.org/analysis/smaller-wealthier-mexico-horizon


32 posted on 02/22/2020 6:17:28 PM PST by Clemenza
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To: Mr Fuji
Just in time for the next Caliphate invasion from the other side of the Mediterranean.

The Muslim invasion of Italy started few years ago, and Sicily is the first part to be effected. -Tom

33 posted on 02/22/2020 6:23:53 PM PST by Capt. Tom
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To: marshmallow

Couldn’t they adopt some policies that encourage larger families?


34 posted on 02/22/2020 6:24:47 PM PST by Williams (Stop Tolerating The Intolerant)
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To: antidemoncrat

Did you forget to insert the sarc tag? The muzzies are pouring into Greece, hoping to use that country as a pathway to Italy.


35 posted on 02/22/2020 6:26:05 PM PST by taxpayerfatigue (Taxpayer Fatigue)
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To: Williams

They should take some lessons from Hungary.


36 posted on 02/22/2020 6:26:48 PM PST by EvilCapitalist (Pets are no substitute for children.)
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To: Petrosius

Girls today are taught that they are FAR too important to ever change a diaper. Diapers are poop. Poop is icky. Babies are icky. QED.


37 posted on 02/22/2020 6:27:45 PM PST by Black Agnes
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To: GOP_Party_Animal
So are you here to talk about Italy’s population decline or just take shots at Catholics? Nevermind. I know what the answer is.

Actually, it was one of your fellow Roman Catholics that fired the first salvo against Rome...see post #2.

He said Italy needs to become catholic again.

*****

Same poster then said, I wish we had a catholic pope to which I replied, oh, but you do have a Roman Catholic pope.

*****

Then another Roman Catholic in post #12 wished Protestants would see birth control was wrong to which I replied I wished Roman Catholics would understand they practice birth control via NFP.

*****

Yet I don't see you asking them the same question....now why is that?

38 posted on 02/22/2020 6:28:33 PM PST by ealgeone
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To: Captain Walker

That is a ridiculous argument


39 posted on 02/22/2020 6:29:16 PM PST by wardaddy (I applaud Jim Robinson for his comments on the Southern Monuments decision ...thank you)
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To: marshmallow

My father in law worked for a volunteer fire department whose motto was ‘we always save the lot’. The Italian lot will always be there. If the inhabitants are juggled who cares?


40 posted on 02/22/2020 6:30:53 PM PST by cymbeline
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