Happy birthday to everyone born on this special day
Less than two months ago, we entered 2024, which is a bit more special because it is a leap year. Probably everyone knows why the leap year exists at all, however, we will remind ourselves. The Earth takes 365.25 days to revolve around the Sun and if we did not add that one day every four years, eventually the calendar year would no longer coincide with the Earth’s rotation. It means that the dates would start moving backwards and, after a certain time, there would be a shift in the seasons. That is why it was decided to add a 29th day to February, which is also the shortest month of the year, every four years.
This rare phenomenon certainly deserves statistical follow-up, so we took a look at the data of demographic statistics and discovered that, according to the 2021 Census data, a total of 2 399 persons in the Republic of Croatia celebrate their birthdays on 29 February.
And in search of those born on this date, we walked through the data as far back as forty years ago, that is, 1984, and discovered that from then until today, the leap year with the largest number of live births on 29 February was 1988, when 202 children were born, while the smallest number of live births on that date was recorded in 2020, when a total of 66 children were born on that date.
A similar number of girls and boys are born on this date, although in total, within the observed ten leap years, more boys were born alive.
Not only is being born on this day special in itself, but the happiness can also be double. Thus, in the millennium year, as many as three pairs of twins were born on 29 February 2000, and in the observed forty-year period, the only leap year without live-born twins was 1992.
Although all persons born on this specific date usually celebrate their birthday the day before or the day after, we believe that it is a great pleasure to blow out the candles on the birthday cake exactly on 29 February. Enjoy your unique day, because the next one is, of course, four (long) years away.
*Vital statistics data are not completely comparable, given that the definition of the total population has changed in the statistical survey on births since 1998.
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