Low Marriage Rate Made Worse by Coronavirus Pandemic

Marriages have dwindled even more drastically amid the coronavirus epidemic this year.

According to Statistics Korea on Wednesday, only 126,367 couples tied the knot from January to July, the fewest since statistics began in 1981.

In previous years around 150,000 couples were married during the same period. In July 17,080 couples married, down 10.9 percent on-year.  

The population is also dwindling as fewer babies are born and more people die. The number of newborns stood at 23,067 in July, down 8,5 percent on-year and the lowest on record for the month, while deaths rose 3.2 percent to 23,963 in the same month.

That means the population has been dwindling for nine months in a row.