Maternity wards are empty and birth-control clinics are full because of the recession.
Fewer babies are being born in the central San Joaquin Valley, mirroring declines statewide and nationwide. Hospital newborn-nurseries that were busy just a couple of years ago now have beds aplenty.
Directors of maternity wards blame the baby bust on people delaying childbearing in the poor economy, and on an immigration slowdown because of a lack of farm jobs.
"The recession has a lot to do with it," along with water cutbacks that have hurt some farmers, said Donna Aldrich, clinical director of maternal child services at Madera Community Hospital. "We had a lot of migrant farmworkers, and they’re just not here."
Deliveries at the hospital have plummeted. Three years ago, nurses helped with 200 births a month -- today the average is about 140 births. And it's dipped to as low as 108 in a month, Aldrich said, "which is incredible for us."
Population researchers suspect the recession is at the root of a decrease in birth rates nationwide in 2008. States like California, which have been hit particularly hard by home foreclosures and job losses, saw the most dramatic declines, they say.
Economists are more cautious about assessing the cause. Birth rates can vary for a variety of reasons, they say. Regardless, dips during economic downturns historically have been short-lived.
The slump in births isn't putting hospitals out of business -- labor and delivery departments typically aren’t big money-makers, like cardiac surgery departments, hospital executives say.
More worrisome, said Mark Foote, vice president of finance at Madera Community, is a general decline in patients who are putting off elective surgeries and other procedures in the recession. A decline in births only adds to the problem, he said.
The numbers
California’s births dropped from 566,137 in 2007 to 551,567 in 2008, for a 2.6% dip in the number of births. The birth rate -- based on births per 1,000 women — dropped 2.8%. The state had the third-highest birth-rate decline, behind Arizona and Mississippi, according to a Pew Research Center report released earlier this month.
A check of the number of births in the Valley showed similar declines between 2007 and 2008 — a 3% drop in Fresno County, 2.9% in Madera, 2.6% in Kings, 4.9% in Merced. Births in Tulare County remained steady.
Pew researchers said they found an association between deteriorating economic conditions and people’s decision to have children. A nationwide survey in October found 14% of people between ages 18 and 34 — and 8% of those ages 35 to 44 — reported postponing a child because of the recession.
The decision to delay childbearing appeared greater among low-income families. Nine percent of people with incomes of $25,000 or less said they had postponed having a child, compared to 2% with incomes of $75,000 or more, the researchers said.
In a sign that people are putting off pregnancies, family-planning clinics in the Valley are jammed with patients who want birth control.
Demand for services is up 14% in the past year at Planned Parenthood Mar Monte, said Patsy Montgomery, the nonprofit’s director of public affairs. "We’ve seen this increase for over a year now," Montgomery said. "And it’s not letting down.
"Most of our clients are saying they can’t afford to expand their family size right now," Montgomery said. "They’ve lost jobs. They’ve lost health insurance, and everything is tight."
Historically in hard economic times, people delay marriage and delay childbearing, said Gary Becker, a professor of economics at the University of Chicago and author of a book of family economics.
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