It had become negative last May over 12 slippery months: from June 2024 to May 2025, there were thus 1,500 more deaths than births, according to the analysis made by AFP of data updated on August 1. But in June, he became positive again over 12 months, with 2,215 births more than death. “A negative balance is of the order of the possible” in 2025, said INSEE, while specifying that he did not make “specific forecasts”. “This is a phenomenon that we had seen coming, France will perhaps cross a symbolic barrier,” said Didier Breton, professor of demography at the University of Strasbourg, however calling for prudence, the flu being able to “have made people die earlier in the year”. For this specialist, “France is becoming like other European countries”. In the European Union, only six out of 27 countries still displayed a positive natural balance in 2024, according to Eurostat: Cyprus, France, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta and Sweden. Denmark was stable, the other nations displayed a negative balance.