Births Registered
145. The number of births registered in 1964 was 108,519, comprising 106,937 Chinese (55,054 male and 51,883 female), and 1,582 non-Chinese (794 male and 788 female). Table XXX gives (a) the numbers of births registered during the years 1955 to 1964 by sex and race with the per- centages of males and females, and of Chinese and non-Chinese, and (b) the live birth rates per thousand of population for the same years. The total number of births registered in 1964 decreased by 6,744 as against the record figure of 115,263 in 1963. As compared with 1963 the year's birth rate of 29.4 per thousand of population was down 2.7 from the 1963 rate. The number of non-Chinese births, namely 1,582 was the highest ever recorded.
146. There is in the Colony a distinct recurrent pattern in the in- cidence of births in the various quarters of the year, namely, first quarter, third highest; second quarter, lowest; third quarter, second highest; fourth quarter, highest. The 1964 births followed this normal pattern, which in the past 11 years has only been broken twice when in 1958 and 1959 the positions in the first two quarters were reversed possibly due to changes in the registration procedure.
147. Table XXXI gives the births registered in 1962, 1963 and 1964 by districts. This shows that the number registered on Hong Kong Island in 1964 dropped by 3,612, in Kowloon and New Kowloon by 1,978 and in the New Territories by 1,154. When these drops are converted into percentages of the 1963 births, the noteworthy fact emerges that the drop on Hong Kong Island was 11.21% whereas the drops in Kowloon and New Kowloon and in the New Territories were only 3.17% and 5.57% respectively. Whether this is due to marked differences in the age groups or the social, economic or other circumstances of women residing in the various districts or to more intense activities of the Hong Kong Family Planning Association on the Island, one can only speculate.
148. On the Island, despite the decreases in all other districts, there was an increase of 497 at Shau Kei Wan, no doubt due to the rapidly increasing population at Chai Wan. In Kowloon and New Kowloon, the number registered at Kwun Tong increased by 1,837, this increase being due mainly to this being the Registry's first full year of operation (it opened on 1st May 1963) and partly to the continued rapid develop- ment in that area. The Queen Elizabeth Hospital Registry, opened on 1st February 1964, naturally considerably lightened the load on the other Kowloon Registries. In the New Territories, while there was an
43