Women Don’t Stop Being Fertile with Age

While information goes around that women’s ability to bear children is prone to diminish as they get on in years, the Family Planning Association (FPA) grows anxious lest many women misinterpret this information and decide they are protected from getting pregnant by their age.

Actually although women approaching their middle age are less likely to get pregnant than younger ones, age alone and even the coming of the menopause do not provide a real guarantee. Preventive measures ought to be taken if no pregnancy is planned.

Julie Bentley, FPA’s Chief Executive, warns: “Whilst the message about fertility declining with age is an important one, it is often overplayed, alongside disproportionate messaging about unplanned teenage pregnancies.

“It sends an inaccurate message to women and society that only the young fall pregnant and is leading older women to believe their fertility has gone long before it actually has.”

The best proof of that is abortion rates which show the same results for women over 40 and under 16 in England and Wales – four of 1,000 women find themselves with an unexpected child. The highest fertility rate – 113.1 for every thousand women – falls on the ages between 30 and 34, according to reports from Office for National Statistics (ONS).

Source of the image: flickr.com/photos/arwen-abendstern.