Ireland's birth rate increased by just over 16% to 16,131 in the first quarter of this year when compared with the same period in 2021.
The Central Statistics Office "Vital Statistics" report for the first quarter of this year shows the average age of mothers was 33.3 years - an increase of more than two months on the same quarter last year.
A decade ago the average age was 31.8 years for the same period.
Gerard Doolan, Statistician in the Vital Statistics Division, said: "We can see the number of births has increased by 2,236 when compared with the same quarter in the previous year, up from 13,895 in quarter one 2021 to 16,131 in quarter one 2022.
"Births to teenage mothers increased from 179 in quarter one 2021 to 194 in quarter one 2022.
"More than two in five of all births were outside of marriage/civil partnership, compared to the same quarter a year earlier when 40.1% of births were to mothers outside of marriage.
"Ten years ago, in quarter one 2012, this proportion was more than one in three births."
The 16,131 births represent an annual birth rate of 12.9 per thousand population, the CSO said.
The highest number of births registered was in Dublin city with 2,041 or 12.7% of total live births in the country, followed by Cork County with 1,355 or 8.4%) of registered births.
Leitrim had the lowest number with 110 registered births.
Deaths
There were 9,535 deaths registered in the first quarter of this year, a decrease of 29 or 0.3% compared with the same period last year.
Cancer and circulatory disease were the biggest causes of death in Ireland in the quarter, accounting for 5,316 or 55.8% of deaths compared with 4,759 or 49.8% for the same period last year.
Some 641 deaths were due to Covid-19, accounting for 6.7% of deaths in the quarter.
There were 277 deaths due to accidents, suicides and other external causes, the CSO report showed.
Accidents accounted for 71.5% or 198 of these deaths, while suicides accounted for 26.4% or 73.
This suicide figure reflects an increase of 102.8.% from the same quarter of 2021.
Of these suicide deaths, 82.2.% were male.
The natural increase in the population - births minus deaths - for quarter one 2022 was 6,596.
The estimated population of Ireland in August 2021 was 5,011,460 people.
