The back-to-back Covid-19 lockdowns that people lived through last year, where people spent unusually longer periods of time with their spouses, left­ behind a baby boom in Rwanda.

As married couples, as well as unmarried ones, spent longer periods of time together for the biggest part of last year, a big number of them got intimate which resulted in pregnancies, where many have already given birth, while others are about to.

A midwife who works in a popular hospital in Kigali, that this paper talked to, said they received an unprecedented number of deliveries early this year, as well as a high number of pregnant women going for consultations.

“The number of deliveries started shooting up from late last year, but when it came to 2021, it went out of hand. At one point we got overwhelmed by the numbers of women coming to give birth.”

“Most of the women who delivered around this time gave birth to girls, the ratio of girls to boys is incredibly huge, it left­ us all in shock” she said. “We are told it is the same situation in many parts of the country,”.

As the married couples left­ the hands of midwives in different hospitals full, the unmarried couples presented extra challenges: They trooped to local government officials to register for civil marriages before giving birth, or before the pregnancies are visible to everyone.

Many unmarried couples who had not even planned weddings, had to organize hushed civil marriages, as they rushed against time to be officially married to avoid the shame of giving birth while unmarried or not staying together.

Even when civil weddings had been suspended as the country intensified efforts to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, many of the unmarried couples exerted pressure on authorities to bend rules and wed them.

During one of the civil marriage events recently, the Executive Secretary of Remera sector, Karambizi Godfrey shared that at one point they had to pause everything else and wed expectant couples.

He said the desperate state many were in pushed authorities to accommodate these couples, even at a time when civil weddings were also prohibited.

Dr Ivan Rukundo, who spoke to Rwanda Today to regarding the circumstances surrounding the baby boom in the country during this time, said he has just noticed this trend from a cycle of friends.

“I think reproduction requires time and the right state of mind for both partners, one would argue that lockdowns brought together partners that were mostly apart for days to weeks and more due to work responsibilities.

“In addition to finding themselves together, I would assume that some couples rediscovered their intimacy and hence a conducive environment to mate and reproduce,” he said.

Unfortunately for many mothers who gave birth during lockdowns, the unfriendly circumstances that included social distancing and isolations meant that they would not get enough care especially at such a time they needed support, because many were alone.

In the Rwandan culture, besides having a birth preparation plan, the mother has a support system made up of family and friends who help with domestic duties after birth, but the pandemic took all this away.

The complications that came with the pandemic even made it hard for parents to register their newly born children, something that is normally done right after childbirth, but wasn’t possible this time around because there were no people operating the electronic child registering systems, since some facilities had to keep fewer people at work.

The 2020 vital statistics report compiled by the National Institute of statistics indicated a slight decrease in birth registration completeness rate, from 87.0 percent in 2019 to 85.8 percent in 2020.

The shares of births registered within 30 days also underwent a downward shift, from 78.0 percent in 2019 to 72.3 percent in 2020.

“This was mainly attributed to Covid19 prevention measures that forced the closure of most economic activities including registration offices in March 2020, followed by frequent restriction of citizens’ movements in the following months” reads the report.

The sharp increase in the number of babies produced by poor and vulnerable families, many of which have even lost their sources of incomes will even be more affected long term, since many can’t even afford the needed healthcare and nutrition care for their newborn children.