Patrick Armstrong at Russia Blog believes the demographic picture is improving somewhat for Russia.
RosStat claims 273,700 births in January and February (up 12.8% over the previous year) and 368,200 deaths (up 4.1%). A bill to restrict abortion advertising has been proposed and a Duma deputy gave some numbers here: In 2006 there were one and a half million abortions (40.3/1000 women) in Russia, down from the two million in 2002 (54.2/1000 women).
So, evidence that the various programs are having an effect. We don’t know yet, of course, whether the programs encourage more children, or just earlier children. Data over the next few years will tell us.
