The statistics agency says that Russia’s population fell by more than one million people in 2021, a historic dip not witnessed since the Soviet Union’s demise.
The epidemic has exacerbated the country’s demographic problems, with Rossat estimating suggestions that more than 660,000 people have perished from coronavirus since the first case was reported.
The new data follow a declining trend that began last year, when Russia’s population plummeted by more than 500,000 people.
Rosstat’s Covid-related fatality rates are significantly higher than those provided on a separate government website dedicated to tracking the pandemic in the country.
Those official website data only include fatalities in whom the virus was determined to be the principal cause of death after an autopsy, resulting in a total of 329,443 deaths.
The disparity has fueled accusations that the Russian government is downplaying the seriousness of the outbreak in one of the world’s worst-affected countries.
Due to a delayed vaccination campaign, limited regulatory measures, and widespread non-compliance with mask-wearing in public areas, Russia has struggled to contain the pandemic.
The pandemic death toll exacerbates Russia’s demographic dilemma, which has worsened by low birth rates and a short life expectancy over the past 30 years.
Because the generation now becoming parents was born in the 1990s, when the birth rate plummeted due to economic uncertainty following the breakup of the Soviet Union, birth rates have been declining.
The average number of births per woman is roughly 1.5, significantly below the 2.1 required to renew the population.
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