US population growth at lowest rate in pandemic’s 1st year

Washington, December 21

Already declining US population growth dipped to its lowest rate since the nation’s founding during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic.

That’s because the coronavirus curtailed immigration, delayed pregnancies and killed hundreds of thousands of US residents. Figures released on Tuesday by the US Census Bureau show the US grew by only 0.1 per cent with only an additional 3,92,665 added to the US population, from July 2020 to July 2021.

The population estimates are derived from calculating the number of births, deaths and migration in the US.

For the first time, international migration surpassed natural increases from births outnumbering deaths. There was a net increase of almost 2,45,000 residents from international migration but only around 1,48,000 from natural increase. —AP