Regional, temporal, and seasonal variations in births and deaths: The effects of famines

Abstract A knowledge of the seasonal variation in births and deaths during normal years is important for analyses of the effects of wars, famines, epidemics or similar privations on these two variables. In studies of seasonally, multiple trigonometric regression models are more flexible than the simple sine curve. The seasonal variation in mortality in Iceland, 1856–1990, shows a strong secular decrease, and a connection between this and the epidemiological transition is considered. As a consequence of the severe famine in Finland in 1867–68, the mortality for the whole year 1868 was almost four times as high as during normal years, and the seasonality of the mortality was even more accentuated. The birth rate in Finland during 1868 was about 70 percent of that during normal years and showed an aberrant seasonality, with a strong trough from October 1868 to February 1869 (fewer conceptions between January and May 1868, when the food shortage was severe).