Fredericton — New Brunswick is not immune to unusual statistical phenomena. The province eats more dulce than the rest of the world combined, its Bay of Fundy has the highest tides, and its shores have more dogfish living along them than any other coast.
Its recreational fishers catch fewer fish per person than any other region in the world, yet its bear hunters snag the highest number of bears per gun owned. New Brunswick residents hate cherry pie while the rest of the world considers it a delight. With its low population, recent influx of foreign blood, and low per-capita birthrate, it should be no surprise there are naming anomalies.
“Not one baby boy has been named Brian in the last two years,” Elizabeth Canning of Statistics New Brunswick told The Manatee. “One girl was named Brian, but she was from Bathurst. You know how they are up there with names.”
Of the 3,337 babies born up to the halfway point in 2016, 1,645 were male, and the most popular name was Mohammad with 129. In 2015, some 3,215 males were born. 215 were named Willard.
The head statistician of the province could not explain the anomalies. “The median number of baby-Brians over the previous 10 years was 33, and we haven’t seen a Willard since the 1970s when no baby-Richards were born in the entire decade.”
Canning suspects the number of baby-Mohammads is due to the influx of refugees from the Middle East, but she cannot make such assumptions. “It’s our job to accumulate numbers. We don’t try to assign causes. That’s a job for politicians.”