Older Mothers: The New Norm?

A New Trend

During 2009, two major statistical surveys in the United States and Canada highlighted a significant shift in the age of first-time mothers. The National Center for Health Statistics is part of a US Federal agency called the ‘Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’, or CDC, which aims to protect public health and safety by providing information to enhance health decision making. It produces regular reports – the NCHS Data Brief – containing up-to-date information. In the August 2009 edition, some significant trends in maternal age at first pregnancy emerged. In 1970, the average age of women giving birth to their first child was 21.4 years; by 2006, this had grown by 3.6 years to 25 years.

While this may not at first sight appear to be a massive shift, average numbers can be a little misleading. On closer inspection, the figures show that the 3.6 year increase was accounted for in large part by a massive eight-fold rise in the number of mothers having their first babies at the age of 35 years and above. The report’s authors, T. J. Mathews (MS) and Brady E. Hamilton (PhD) drew attention to the significance of this age rise: such a trend has implications for a population’s future growth because it sets additional limits on the number of children a woman can have.

In Japan, the average age of mothers at first birth has risen over a comparable period to 29.2 years and in Switzerland to 29.4 years. This is clearly a growing phenomenon in the developed world. A similar report released by the Canadian Institute for Health Information in January 2009 showed that the number of women over 35 giving birth to first babies since 1982 had more than trebled, rising from 5% to 18% of the total. This represents 44.9 first births to women over 35 for every 1000 (the figures are 47.3 per 1000 for the United States and an even higher 53.5 per 1000 for the United Kingdom). They also noted that older first time mothers are more inclined to face difficulties with birth defects and low birth weight than their younger counterparts.

Risk

The message for women that technological advances and better general health is enabling older women to have babies is somewhat mixed. While these advances undoubtedly enhance choice for women, enabling them to develop careers and ‘find the right partner’ as never before, they also face insurmountable health risks, both to themselves and to their babies. Commenting on the Canadian report, Dr. Jeffrey Roberts, an infertility specialist and reproductive endocrinologist at the Pacific Center for Reproductive Medicine in Vancouver explained that women approaching the age of 45 are known to face a 75% increased risk of miscarriage. Furthermore, the risk of Down’s syndrome rises from one in every 800 to 1000 pregnancies to over one in 100. Additionally, women over 40 are more prone to producing more eggs at once, increasing the chance of having pre-term twins; premature babies are also likely to have an array of complicated health problems and risks.

Even so, increasing numbers of women appear to be willing to face these risks. It is a trend, in other words, which is becoming increasingly normal. While the deluge of publicity surrounding Ranjit Hayer, the 60 year-old first time mother who gave birth to twin boys in February of 2009, may strike some as a little extreme, many more women are now considering – and having – later pregnancies. Since Hayer, who received the help of reproductive technology in India, had tried for decades to have children – and has a large extended family network and supportive husband to help her raise her boys – she can hardly be accused of being either rash or impulsive.

Opportunity

While not disputing Dr. Roberts’ evaluation of the additional risks faced by older mothers and their newborns, Associate Professor of Communication and Culture at the University of Calgary, Aradhana Parmar, brings out some other dimensions of the phenomenon. Parmar, who also teaches Women’s Studies and Development Studies, believes passionately that women can benefit considerably from the ability to have later pregnancies. She emphasizes that the new technology has emerged at a time when there are far more women professionals in the workplace than at any time in history; by the time they have built their careers and furthered their education, many are in their 30s before they are able to ‘settle down’ to family life. Parmar believes that if a healthy woman of fifty, who can provide superb facilities and enormous love and affection to a child, chooses to have a baby, this should not be faulted, but rather supported. She has a point; large numbers of children are the result of unplanned and even worse, unwanted pregnancies; no matter how well and young their mothers may be, these children and their parents may face far more of a struggle than Parmar’s enthusiastic fifty year old first time mother.

In September, Statistics Canada revealed data which lend support to Parmar’s views. Exploring the growing trend in later first-time pregnancies, it found that children born to mothers over 35 years of age were no less healthy in general than children born to younger mothers. While they are at greater risk of birth defects, as Dr. Roberts indicated, babies who are born healthy to mothers over 35 go on being healthy post-partum, with health, behavioral and cognitive outcomes up to the age of five virtually identical to children born to younger mothers aged 25 – 29.

Older women who keep themselves healthy before, during and after pregnancy are physically and emotionally well able to carry a child to term and subsequently proceed with the business of parenting. Health and nutrition can be crucial – a diet enriched by probiotics, multivitamin supplements and antioxidants will help guard against the wear and tear of a pregnancy. There may be some increased risks at the outset, but the new possibilities for later pregnancies also bring greater opportunities for women, as well.

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