The Covid-19 pandemic of 2020 had a huge global impact in various sectors. It disrupted the economy, the workforce, the government, the environment as well as educational and home setups. The arrival of coronavirus got the whole world making decisions they didn’t think they’d have to make before.

Some plans went through a revamp while others were put off altogether. Some even found new possibilities that would not have been an option before. Pregnancy and birth plans are one such factor. Hospitals were filled with Covid-19 patients. Did they have the resources to provide for other patients while cut off from most of the world?

In line with this, Real Research conducted a public poll on how the pandemic affected the pregnancy plans of couples. Did they reconsider their plans and postpone pregnancy or did they decide otherwise? We will see the factors that influenced couples’ decisions to procreate or not during the pandemic. Furthermore, we will also find out their view about pregnancy during a pandemic.

Highlights

  • 43% of the respondents said they planned on having a baby before the pandemic.
  • 91% of the respondents said that the pandemic affected their birth plans.
  • Almost 30% decided to postpone their birth plans due to job losses during the pandemic.
  • Over 23% chose to have a child earlier than planned due to a work-from-home setup.
  • Just over 14% deemed it extremely unsafe to be pregnant during a pandemic.

From a total of 150,000 respondents, 26.76% said that they are in their 20s, 29.81% are in their 30s, 23.26% are in their 40s, 12.66% are in their 50s, and 7.49% are over the age of 60. Meanwhile, the responses consist of 76% being from those identifying as male while 24% consists of those identifying as female.

Furthermore, 96.8% of the responses came from married individuals. In addition, 1.8% of the responses came from single respondents and 1.4% came from individuals in live-in relationships. While the survey was answered by respondents all over the world, the top-highest responses came from Bangladesh, India, Russia, and Vietnam, respectively.

Over 60% Agree That Covid-19 Pandemic Affected Their Birth Plans

Figure 1. The majority said they planned to have a baby before the pandemic
Figure 1. The majority said they planned to have a baby before the pandemic

From the total responses, our survey found that 58.43% of the respondents had already planned on having a baby before the pandemic. Considering that the majority of the responses came from married individuals, this is not a surprising statistic. It seems most were ready to take the next phase in their marriage.

However, upon asking the respondents if their decision changed during the pandemic, 60.91% said ‘Yes’. This means that the arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic did in fact affect the respondents’ birth plans. Almost 40% chose ‘No’, showing that there was still a big group of respondents who proceeded with their initial plans even during the pandemic.

Figure 2. The majority said that their birth plans changed after the pandemic
Figure 2. The majority said that their birth plans changed after the pandemic

Deciding Factors on Delayed Birth Plans

When asked how the pandemic affected their birth plans, we see an interesting split in the decisions made. Both ‘wish to postpone pregnancy and ‘wish to have a child earlier than planned’ got an even pick. Both options were picked by the respondents on a 34%-35% scale each.

This is remarkable, as we see how differently the birth plans switched. It went equally in either direction. So, we can clearly say that the pandemic truly did largely impact birth plans. Only about 20% said that the pandemic ‘did not affect’ their birth plans while a smaller group said that they did not want to have children anymore’.

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When asked what factors caused respondents to reconsider their birth plan by postponing them, we saw that the top-most response went to ‘lost job during the pandemic’ at 29.67%. This was closely followed by the option ‘decrease on wages’ at 20.88%. It is understandable that these two choices reigned as the topmost reasons for couples to have postponed their birth plans.

Having a baby is no small decision, it is a huge responsibility —  a responsibility that is usually backed by a stable income. Many companies had to cut down on expenses to survive the pandemic, in some cases they did so by cutting employee salaries or by decreasing their workforce.

The third highest pick was ‘health concerns over pandemic’ at 18.99%. It seems a high number of the respondents were unsure about getting pregnant due to health certainty during the pandemic. This could possibly be due to coronavirus being very new. Most people were unsure of the effects on a newborn or a pregnant woman. Not to mention that most hospitals were overflowing with Covid-19 patients and most citizens were on lockdown or asked to isolate at home.

Deciding Factors on Accelerated Birth Plans

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On the other hand, the survey also asked respondents what the factors were for them to decide on having a baby ahead of their initial plans. The highest response here was ‘pressure from friends and loved ones’. This was closely followed by ‘work from home set up’ and ‘stuck at home and unable to travel’.

It seems most respondents felt pressured by those around them to have a baby during the pandemic. Perhaps they felt that this massive global pause was to be used as an opportunity to start a family. It seems from the responses that most respondents found it easier to focus on expanding their families with the option of working from home.

Others may have had plans to travel and see more of the world first before settling down and having children. However, when faced with a ban on travel for the foreseeable future, it seems many have reconsidered and went ahead with accelerated birth plans.

Another reason that has led to this decision was having ‘stable income despite the pandemic’. Some respondents saw fit to hasten birth plans as they continued to earn a steady living through trying times. This is an interesting find, as we found out that the greatest reason for delayed birth plans was due to losing jobs and decreased salaries. We now know that the opposite is true, those with stable incomes hastened their birth plans during the pandemic.

Most Find It Extremely Safe to Get Pregnant During a Pandemic

Figure 5. View on pregnancy being safe during the pandemic
Figure 5. View on pregnancy being safe during the pandemic

Almost 25% said that they saw pregnancy during a pandemic as ‘extremely safe’. Interestingly, both ‘somewhat safe’ and ‘somewhat unsafe’ got 20% responses each. Only about 15% felt that pregnancy during a pandemic is ‘extremely unsafe’. We see a very mixed statistic on this question.

This is understandable as the Covid-19 pandemic is relatively new; we haven’t seen something like this in our lifetime before. Most people either speculate and wait it out, while others don’t spare much thought and just keep carrying on. After all, humanity always works to adjust, adapt, and overcome.

Conclusion

From the collected data of Real Research, we can conclude that the pandemic did, in fact, affect couples’ birth plans. Some decided to postpone having a baby due to the financial trouble caused by the pandemic. While others chose to delay their birth plans due to the shaky medical situation.

On the other hand, some of the respondents decided to hasten their birth plans. While some made this decision due to the convenience of working from home, others succumbed to familial pressure. Still, others saw fit to start building their family while being stuck at home since traveling was not an option.

Methodology

Survey TitleCovid-19 Pandemic Effect On Couples’ Birth Plans
DurationFebruary 8th to 17th, 2021
Number of Participants150,000
DemographicsMales and females, aged 19 to 60+
Participating Countries Afghanistan, Algeria, American Samoa, Andorra, Angola, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, AzerbaijanBahrain, Bangladesh, Belarus, Belgium, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Brunei, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Estonia, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Israel, Italy, Ivory Coast, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Latvia, Lebanon, Libya, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Madagascar, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Malta, Mauritania, Mexico, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar [Burma], Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Nigeria, North Korea, Oman, Pakistan, Palestine, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Seychelles, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Somalia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe