The Dominican Republic is on track to record its lowest birth rate in two decades this year, a sharp decline that appears to be directly linked to new government restrictions on healthcare services for Haitian mothers, Diario Libre reports.
Official statistics from the Central Electoral Board (JCE) show that as of 2 November 2025, total registered births stood at 148,722, nearly 10,000 fewer than the same period in 2024.
The decline is acutely pronounced among foreign nationals. Registrations of foreign-born children plummeted by 8,176 this year, falling from 20,502 to just 12,326 in the same period.
This drop coincides with the government’s implementation of a new hospital protocol in April 2025, which restricts maternity care for Haitian women—a move aimed at curbing what authorities refer to as “birth tourism” from the neighboring country. The new protocols allow for foreign nationals arriving to emergency rooms to give birth to do so, but these are subsequently deported to Haiti as soon as mother and child are released from the hospital. The action has reduced the number of arrivals for the free Dominican hospital services.
The most significant monthly declines in total registered births compared to 2024 occurred after the April 2025 restrictions:
October: -2,952 fewer births
August: -2,646 fewer births
April: -2,015 fewer births
While the total number of registered foreign births had been high (29,362 in 2022 and 29,896 in 2023), the recent restrictions have precipitated a dramatic reduction in this specific demographic.
Historically, the number of registered foreign births surged following the controversial 2013 Constitutional Court ruling (Sentence 168-13), which ordered an audit of birth registries and mandated that children of foreigners be registered in a separate foreign registry, moving from 6,279 in 2013 to 22,689 in 2015.
Dominican demographics are changing
Stripping away the births of foreign nationals reveals an even more troubling trend for the country’s native-born population, Diario Libre reports. Without the numbers generated by non-Dominican mothers, the national birth rate for Dominicans is in a concerning freefall, contributing to a confirmed aging of the population, according to the X Census from the National Statistics Office (ONE).
Between 2010 and 2022, the Dominican Republic’s annual growth rate was a mere 1.11%, marking the lowest in its recent history. During this 12-year period, the population increased by 1,326,223 inhabitants, while 204,125 foreign births were recorded by the JCE, highlighting the demographic importance of non-native births.
The sustained decline in the annual growth rate, which peaked at 3.56% between 1920 and 1935, signals a demographic shift and the ongoing aging of Dominican society.
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Diario Libre
5 November 2025