Mother and baby report card for NSW

By Dr. Ananya Mandal, MDMar 7 2011

The Government statistics on births in New South Wales Mothers and Babies 2008, which was released on Saturday. It showed that 96,343 babies were born in NSW that year - 12 per cent more than the 85,262 born in 2004.

Women living in Sydney’s west and south-west accounted for 40 per cent of all new births, Health Minister Carmel Tebbutt said. Boys made up 51.1 per cent of these babies. 'The average age of mothers has continued to rise to over 30 as more women opt to defer pregnancy until their early-to-mid 30s,’ Ms Tebbutt said. The figures show there were 18,585 babies born to mothers aged 35 years or older and 3581 to women aged between 40 and 44 years. Another 158 babies were born to mothers older than 45 years. More families are also choosing to have more number of children with a rise in the number of mothers having five or more children said the report. The report showed home births have more than doubled from 114 four years ago to 243. Most women opted for some form of pain relief with just 10,466 giving birth drug-free. The number of babies born to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mothers also increased from 2333 to 3015 a year.

The report also revealed that almost one-third of babies born in NSW are now delivered by caesarean. This rate is one of the highest rates in the developed world. Experts believe that older maternal age could be linked to the trend. The number of women electing to have a caesarean has risen from 12,930 four years ago to 16,120. Emergency caesareans have also jumped from 9974 to 11,854 a year. Gestational diabetes, which occurs during pregnancy, has risen from 3592 cases to 4509.

Royal Prince Alfred obstetrician Dr Andrew Child said, “We do have a reasonably high caesarean rate and there is definitely a link with age...It’s often because women are anxious and having waited so long, they just want to have a caesarean. There is the fear factor but it’s also for cosmetic reasons - in Chile, they say the high rate of caesareans there is linked to women wanting to stay honeymoon fresh so there is a probably a bit of that here, too.” Dr Child said delaying a child until later in life also led to greater health risks such as diabetes and high blood pressure in mothers. He said women were designed to have their first baby at the age of 20, with those 27 years and older considered “elderly” in pregnancy terms.

NSW Health Minister Carmel Tebbutt said the report confirmed the baby boom of recent years was not yet over. Women in NSW were also enjoying the highest standard of maternity care with birth outcomes that ranked among the best in the world, she said. She added, “The report shows NSW has the lowest rates of prematurity of any state in the country, and rates of perinatal death and low birth weight that are lower in NSW than for Australia overall.”

On the brighter side, more mothers are also breastfeeding their babies upon discharge from hospital. Almost 80 per cent of babies were being breast-fed, with only 12 per cent solely on infant formula.