Risk factor for pregnancies in older women played down

MOST pregnant women aged 35 to 40 give birth to perfectly healthy babies, according to one of the country’s leading experts in foetal abnormalities.

Prof Fergal Malone, head of the department of obstetrics and gynaecology at the Royal College of Surgeons (Ireland), was responding to an editorial in this week’s British Medical Journal (BMJ) called ‘Which career first? - The most secure age for childbearing remains 20-35’.

The editorial said it was harder for older women to become and stay pregnant, and outcomes for the mother and child were poorer. It also said age-related fertility problems increase after 35 and dramatically after 40.