Changing Reproductive Plans of the Student Youth Caused by COVID-19 Pandemic and the Russian Aggression: The Potential Impact on the Birth Rate in Ukraine

Abstract

The synergic effect of a sophisticated array of factors (economic, social and political instability in Ukraine) caused a sustained decline in the birth rate beginning with 2014. Negative shifts in the life activity, triggered by the pandemic of coronavirus (since 2020) due to the forced delay of childbirth, heightened the pace of this decline. The large-scale Russian aggression (started on 24 February, 2022) determined the change in reproductive plans of Ukrainian citizens and their feasibilities. The research objective is to reveal, on the basis of a sociological study, the stance of the Ukrainian student youth from higher education institutions (HEIs) on reproductive plans, and the vision of the impact on them of COVID-19 pandemic and the beginning of the large-scale war; to analyze and determine an array of factors with impact on the childbirth in the present-day Ukraine; and to justify the assumption regarding the prospects of childbirth dynamics. The information base was results from an interview designed to reveal the impact of COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian-Ukrainian war on the students’ life and health, held by the Ptoukha Institute for Demography and Social Studies of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine in May, 2022. The online interview (by self-filling of a Google questionnaire) covered 523 respondents from 17 HEIs located across Ukraine. The questionnaire contained questions on crucial changes in the student life and sentiment by two modules: since the outbreak of the large-scale Russian aggression, and since the outbreak of the pandemic. In spite of certain limitations caused by the time span and the modalities of the study, its results are a reflection of the stance on reproductive plans for a large group of the student youth over the several earliest months of the war. Results of the study showed that change in reproductive plans had already triggered a decline in the birth rate in this social group, and enabled for a projection of the falling childbirth in the forthcoming future. The significance of COVID-19 pandemic as an impediment to reproductive plans was revealed to be smaller compared with the war. Regarding the character of the impact of the large-scale Russian aggression on the childbirth plans, the option most often chosen by the respondents (56.9%) was “the war made me postpone the childbirth till the time after the victory over the enemy”. For 24.6% of the respondents, either postponement or abandonment of reproductive plans was caused not so much by the war as by the related change of a residence place, reduced or lost income, poorer access to purchase or rent of housing, etc. According to 9.2% of the respondents, this was caused by deteriorated personal ties. Crucial factors behind the changed birth rate in the present-day Ukraine were revealed. The expectation of the accelerating childbirth decline in Ukraine after the end of the war is attributed to both objective factors (the declining number of persons in the reproductive age and their respective share in the gender and age structure, ageing of the population, the increased average age for the birth of the first child, the disrupted somatic and reproductive health with a part of the population) and the subjective ones (the postponement of the planned decision about childbirth or even giving up on it). Also, there is a probability of changing childbirth due to the understudied long-term impact of COVID-19 pandemic on human heath, including reproductive one.