A majority of Burma's estimated 50 million people are ethnic Burmans. Shans, Karens, Arakanese, Kachins, Chins, Mons, and many other smaller indigenous ethnic groups form about 30% of the population. Indians and Chinese are the largest immigrant groups.

Although Burmese is the most widely spoken language, other ethnic groups have retained their own languages. English is spoken in the capital Rangoon and in areas frequented by tourists. The Indian and Chinese residents speak various languages and dialects of their homelands: Hindi, Urdu, Tamil, Bengali, Mandarin, Fujianese, and Cantonese.

According to the 1974 Constitution, Buddhism is the official religion of Burma. An estimated 89% of the population practices it. Other religions, Christian 4%--Baptist 3%, Roman Catholic 1%--Muslim 4%, and animist 1%, are less prevalent.

Much of the population lives without basic sanitation or running water. In 1997, the World Health Organization (WHO) ranked Burma's health infrastructure second to last globally. High infant mortality rates and short life expectancies further highlight poor health and living conditions. The HIV/AIDS epidemic poses a serious threat to the Burmese population, as do tuberculosis and malaria.

There are numerous documented human rights violations, and internal displacement of ethnic minorities also is prevalent. Several million Burmese, many of them ethnic minorities, have fled for economic and political reasons to the neighboring countries of Bangladesh, India, China, and Thailand to seek work and asylum. More than 160,000 Burmese live in the nine refugee camps in Thailand and the two in Bangladesh while hundreds of thousands of other Burmese work and reside illegally in the countries in the region.