South Korea has shuttered over 4,000 schools since 1980, the Education Ministry revealed this week, as the nation grapples with a catastrophic plunge in birth rates and plummeting student enrollment. The closures include nearly 3,700 elementary schools, with another 107 schools projected to close in the next five years.
School enrollment has fallen by nearly 5 million students since 1980. Experts expect another 800,000 fewer students by 2030. The Education Ministry cited the country’s record-low birth rate—now at 0.79 children per woman, the lowest in the world—as the primary reason for the closures.
Teen mental health has also worsened, with 221 teen suicides recorded in 2024, more than doubling since 2021. The government is pledging to hire mental health professionals and expand crisis services in schools as part of a national emergency response.
The collapse of the child population has also hit pediatric care. With fewer babies being born, hospitals are closing pediatric units and medical students are avoiding the specialty. In two highly publicized 2023 cases, a 17-year-old and a 5-year-old both died after being rejected by multiple hospitals lacking pediatric staff.
Although the government reported a modest 8.7% rise in childbirths from April 2024 to April 2025, experts say it will take far more than incentives to reverse the cultural hostility toward raising children. The spread of “no-kid zones” in cafes, museums, and even libraries—including the National Library of Korea—has become symbolic of the nation’s demographic crisis.
South Korea’s fertility crisis is part of a broader global trend. The UN Population Fund warned in June that many countries now face population decline due to a mix of economic strain and anti-natalist social norms.
