Newly-released data shows just three areas of the country had more deaths than births in 2021.

These were Belmullet in County Mayo, Glenties in County Donegal and Bantry-West in Cork.

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has examined birth and death rates in Local Electoral Areas (LEA) across the country in 2021.

North Inner-City Dublin had the highest number of births in 2021 at 755.

Galway City Central had the lowest birth rate at 8.3 per 1,000 of population.

Birth Rate, Death Rate, and Natural Increase Rate, per 1,000 of population, 2021. Source: CSO

The majority of births and deaths occurred in and around Dublin. Clontarf had the largest number of deaths in 2021 at 528.

Cork City North-West was the area outside of Dublin with the largest number of deaths at 407.

Leixlip in County Kildare had the lowest number of deaths with 65.

Belmullet in County Mayo had the highest crude death rate - the number of deaths divided by the population - at 13.2.

Blanchardstown-Mulhuddart in Fingal had the lowest crude death rate at 2.1.

Just over 4.5% of deaths were due to external causes such as accidents, assaults and other external factors.

Fertility

The fertility rate was highest in Carrick-On-Shannon in County Leitrim with 61.2 births per 1,000 women aged 15 to 49.

This was followed by Enniscorthy in County Wexford (60.8), and Ballybay-Clones in County Monaghan (60.6).

Urban areas such as South-East Inner City Dublin (29.8), Galway City Central (30.5) and North Inner City Dublin (31.1) had the lowest general fertility rate.

Overall there were 34,844 deaths and 60,575 births recorded in 2021.

Main image: The pier in the town of Belmullet, Co Mayo flying the Irish Tricolour, 10-8-17. Image: Michael David Murphy / Alamy