EU predictions show a startling decline in Poland’s population. Tytus Żmijewski/PAP

Poland’s population could drop by over 25 percent over the next 80 years, according to new forecasts released by the EU.

The Eurostat data, published on July 10, predicts that the population of the EU as a whole will decline rapidly after peaking at 525 million in 2044, falling to 492.9 million by around 2100.

If correct, it means the Polish population has already peaked at 38 million and will steadily decline to 27.5 million in 2100; losing over a quarter of its population.

The number of young people will decline while the old-age population is expected to soar.Eurostat

Greece will suffer a similar fate, dropping from 10.7 million today to 7.5 million in 2100. The German population will drop slightly while France will buck the trend and see its population rise from 67 million to a peak of 73 million in 2091, before dropping slightly to 72.9 million in 2100.

More detailed demographic analysis reveals that there will be a dramatic increase in the number of citizens aged over 70. The biggest shift being the over 85s where it is forecast that their percentage of the total population will jump from the current 2.1 percent to 9.6 percent in 2100. In real terms this will be a rise from 768,000 to 2,656,000 people.

No place to be a 30-something.Paul Smith/unsplash

The biggest decline will be in the number of people in their thirties. At the moment 16.2 percent of the Polish population are in their thirties, a total of 6,123,000, but that number will more than halve to around 2,851,000 people in 2100.

This raises many questions about how the economy will function with a reduced number of people and how the health care system will cope with the extra demand placed on it by an aging population.







