Pope Francis worried about cost of child rearing after Italy’s birth rate sinks

The pontiff said polls showed most young people wanted to have children, but were worried about the expense

‘An Italy without children is an Italy that does not plan for the future,’ Prime Minister Draghi says

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Pope Francis attends a conference on Italy’s demographic crisis in Rome on Friday. Photo: EPA-EFE

Published: 9:31pm, 14 May 2021Updated: 9:33pm, 14 May 2021

Pope Francis said on Friday the cost of raising children was too high and that parents needed more help if countries such as Italy were to overcome the low birth rates that were undermining their future.

Speaking at a conference on Italy’s dearth of babies, Francis said polls showed most young people wanted to have children, but were worried about the expense.

“Their dreams of a new life, the seeds of the country’s rebirth, come up against a demographic winter that is cold and dark,” the pope said.

“For the future to be good, we need to look after families, especially young families, who are beset by worries that risk paralysing their life plans. I am thinking of the fears caused by the increasingly unaffordable costs of raising children.”

Speaking at the same event, Prime Minister Mario Draghi said Italy had just 404,000 births last year, the lowest since records began and down 30 per cent on 12 years ago, while deaths totalled 746,000, lifted in part by the coronavirus pandemic.