> Russia faces a deepening demographic crisis that has been exacerbated by the war in Ukraine.

> Under the updated guidelines for reproductive health checks, doctors in Russia will ask women how many children they plan to have. If a woman replies that she does not intend to give birth, “it is recommended to send the patient to a consultation with a medical psychologist with the goal of forming a positive attitude towards having children”. The recommendation does not apply to men who have no desire to have children.

> In 2024 there were 600,000 more deaths than births in Russia and birth rates fell to their lowest since President Putin came to power in 2000, according to Rosstat, the state statistics service. The current population is 146 million, according to official figures that some analysts suspect have been inflated. Forecasts suggest the country’s population could fall to 90 million or less by the end of the century.

im no expert but i don't think that will help

People have children when they have economically vibrant lives that allow them to live comfortably, with sufficient energy left over after employment to raise said children.

People have children when they see a future for those children to inherit, when they can see a place in the future for their children to occupy.

People have children when they have hope and optimism, when they see their family unit benefitting more with children than without.

Put women into an environment that denies them all three of these, and despite many to most of them wishing for children at some point in their lives, most will go through extreme lengths to avoid having them.

It’s why, for example, many younger climate scientists are also forgoing children… because the emerging, pre-publish data that is not yet accessible to the public at large is absolutely horrifying, and they simply don’t want to curse their own offspring with the future that the data says we are hurtling towards.