The United States’s fertility rate continued its two-decade-long decline during the first quarter of 2026, according to new provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released Tuesday. The general fertility rate, or the number of births per 1,000 childbearing age women, dropped to 53 during the first three months of 2026. That means fewer than 900,000 babies have been born in the U.S. so far this year. Fertility rates and birth rates are key measures for demographers measuring population health, along with death rates and net immigration.
The U.S. birth and fertility rates have been on a steady decline since 2007, during the Great Recession, when more millennial women began delaying childbirth until their late 20s or early 30s.The new data come after the CDC announced in April that the total number of births last year fell by a full 1% to only 3.6 million, hitting a record low.Reversing the trend of declining birth rates has been a central focus of the Trump administration.Last year, the Trump administration established tax-advantaged savings accounts for babies born between January 2025 and December 2028 in part to incentivize births. The Department of Health and Human Services also launched the website Moms.gov with resources for pregnant women, new parents, and aspiring parents, including access to discounted prescriptions for in vitro fertilization and other assisted fertility methods.Much of the decline in U.S. birthrates, as with most developed countries, has been the falling of teenage pregnancy rates since the turn of the 21st century. Since 1991, teenage pregnancy rates have dropped by 81%. But the provisional data for January through March of this year indicates that birth rates are declining for women of all ages, not just teenagers and women in their early 20s. The birth rate decline was for women aged 20 to 24, dropping from 56.1 in the first quarter of 2025 to 52.4 in the first quarter of 2026. For women ages 25 to 29, the birth rate fell from 91.1 to 87.9 during that same time frame. DOCTOR’S VISITS FOR ABORTION PILLS BECOME MANDATORY IN IOWA JULY 1Birthrates for women in their thirties also decreased since this time last year. The number of babies born to women over age 40 remained constant compared to 2025.Earlier this year, the Congressional Budget Office predicted that the total U.S. population would begin to shrink by 2056 due to decreasing birth rates if trends continue for the next 30 years.
