Follow
More and more twins are born in the U.S. despite general birth rates being low
STATES CHRONICLE – Despite the fact the birth rate is not high in the U.S. it looks like twins are born at a record rate in our country.
In the past few years the United States has registered a very big drop in birth rates which have been in a constant decline. Experts believe that the dramatic drop is due to the economic instability which actually marked the beginning of decline in birth rates in 2008, when the economic crises started expanding and affecting the population. They link birth rate to economy because there is already a precedent for this which happened in the 1930s when the US was affected by the Great Depression.
However, although U.S. birth rates are quite law, what is increasing is the rate of twins born in our country, a rate which hit a new record in 2014, according to the CDC. It seems that last year, statistically speaking out of 1,000 births, 33.9 were twins. The year of 2013 was also quite generous in twins, with a rate of 33.7 and it is quite likely that this year a new record might be set.
Ever since 1980 the number of twins born has been rising regardless of origin. Hispanic, white and African-American women in general gave birth to more twins in the last three decades. In the last couple of years, however, the twin birth rate for Hispanic and white women has stagnated, while it continued to rise for African-American women with about 4 percent.
So, why twin birth rates are still increasing while birth rates in general are registering a decline? Although scientists did look into the issue, the answer is still not known for sure. However, there are some suppositions concerning the matter such as the fact that more and more women use in vitro fertilization and also more women give birth later in life. Apparently, giving birth later leads to a higher probability of having twins.
In the meantime, the rate for triplets has dropped 5 percent and has dropped 40 percent since the end of the 1990s.
All in all, is quite hard to figure out how the birth rates can increase or decrease so dramatically with no apparent reason, but having twins probably makes happy a lot of people, so there’s nothing bad in that.
Image source: www.bing.com
