U.S. births rose in 2021 for first time in years, but still lower than before pandemic

U.S. births bumped up last year, but the number of babies born was still lower than before the coronavirus pandemic.

The small 1% increase was the first uptick since 2014. It was a bit of a rebound from 2020, the first year of the pandemic, which witnessed the largest one-year drop in the U.S. births in nearly 50 years.

But there were still about 86,000 fewer births last year than in 2019, according to a government report released Tuesday.