Romania: SOCIETY

Population: Romania’s population has declined every year since 1990, the result of falling birthrates, increasing mortality rates, and emigration. According to figures from the Romanian government, in 2003 Romania’s population was estimated at 21.7 million, with an annual growth rate of –0.3 percent. According to the United States Census Bureau, population density in Romania in 2003 was 97.2 persons per square kilometer. Slightly more than half of the population lives in urban areas. At the end of 2003, Romania hosted about 200 refugees while some 3,700 Romanians, mostly Roma, were refugees seeking asylum abroad.

Demography: In 2004, 16.2 percent of the population was less than 15 years of age, 69.4 percent was 15–64, and those aged 65 and older accounted for 14.4 percent of the population. In the overall population, there were 0.95 males for every female. The number of births per 1,000 was 10.6, the number of deaths, 11.7. The infant mortality rate per 1,000 live births was 27.2, one of the highest rates in Europe. Maternal mortality rates were six times the average for the European Union. The fertility rate was 1.35 children born per woman. Life expectancy at birth was estimated at 71.1 years (67.6 years for men, 74.8 years for women), one of the lowest rates in Europe.

Ethnic Groups: The majority of the population (89 percent) is ethnic Romanian, with a small minority of Hungarians (7.1 percent) and even fewer Germans, Ukrainians, Serbs, Croats, Russians, Turks, and Roma (3 percent cumulatively).

Languages: Romanian is the official language. Hungarian (Magyar), is commonly used as well, particularly in the western and northwestern areas. English and French are widely spoken as second and third languages, especially among younger Romanians.

Religion: According to the Romanian government, 86. 7 percent of the population is Eastern Orthodox; 4.7 percent, Roman Catholic; 3.2 percent, Protestant; less than 1 percent, Greek Catholic; and less than 1 percent, Jewish.

Education and Literacy: Education in Romania is compulsory for the first 10 years of schooling, and 98 percent of children attend school. In 2001 Romania had some 14,000 primary and secondary schools attended by roughly 3 million students and staffed by 230,000 teachers. In that same year, there were approximately 90 vocational schools with enrollments totaling 250,000 students, 103 specialized technical schools with 72,000 students, and 129 institutions of higher education with more than half a million students. The literacy rate in Romania is 98.4 percent (99.1 percent male, 97.4 percent female).

Health: Health care is generally poor by European standards, and access to health care is limited in many rural areas. In 2001 health expenditures were equal to 6.5 percent of gross domestic product. In 2004 there were 1.9 physicians and 7.5 hospital beds per 1,000 people. The adult rate of prevalence of human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is low at less than 0.1 percent. Nevertheless, there are concerns that rates of prevalence could rise in the future, as Romania has a high rate of syphilis, and there is evidence of a significant lack of awareness in key areas such as HIV transmission and prevention. Intravenous drug use is also a major risk factor in Bucharest, where it is estimated that 1 percent of the population is injecting heroin. The number of pediatric AIDS cases is one of the highest in Europe, a grotesque legacy of the Ceauşescu regime when the use of unscreened blood and blood products and the repeated use of contaminated needles in hospitals and orphanages led to thousands of newborn and young children becoming infected with HIV.

Welfare: The Romanian social insurance system is funded by employee/employer contributions and government payments. The social insurance system provides a variety of benefits including old-age pensions, disability benefits, workers’ compensation for injuries sustained on the job, unemployment benefits, and family allowances. The system likely suffers from a shortage of capital and human resources, as well as poor distribution, especially in rural areas. The Romanian child welfare system continues to struggle with the large number of orphans, a legacy of the Ceauşescu regime. According to some estimates, nearly 50,000 children are wards of the state, with 10,000 children abandoned at hospitals each year. An effort in 2002 to modernize child welfare law to meet European Union standards, although well intentioned, has had mixed results at best.

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