Update: The NHS maternity statistics released on Wednesday 9 November contained some errors. Updated statistics can be seen below:
- The number of deliveries for mothers aged under 20 has almost halved over the last 10 years, from 43,572 deliveries in 2005/06 (not 44,123 as originally reported) to 22,032 in 2015/16.
- The number of deliveries for mothers aged 40 years and over has risen from 20,530 in 2005/06 (not 22,123 as originally reported) to 24,942 in 2015/16, an increase of 21.5 per cent (not 12.7 per cent as originally reported).
The number of women giving birth under the age of 20 has halved over the past 10 years, newly-released NHS statistics have shown.
Exactly 22,032 women under 20 gave birth in NHS hospitals in 2015/16, compared to 44,123 deliveries in 2005/6.
The figures were released as part of NHS Digital’s ‘Hospital Maternity Activity’ published on Wednesday 9 November.
The graph above, released by NHS Digital, also shows there has been a 12.7% increase in women over 40 giving birth in the past ten years (from 22,123 in 2005/06 to 24,942 in 2015/16).
The number of women giving birth between the ages of 20 and 30 has slightly risen year-on-year.
There were 164 children who gave birth aged 14 and under in 2015/16 in NHS hospitals. This is a slight increase from 2013/14, when 133 girls aged under 14 gave birth.
In total, there were 648,107 births in NHS hospitals during 2015/16, which was an increase of 1.8% compared to last year.
The statistics also revealed the type of births women have had.
The proportion of spontaneous deliveries has dropped from 64.8% in 2005/06 to 60% in 2015/16.
Caesarean deliveries increased by 3%, from 24.1% in 2005/6 to 27.1% in 2015/16.
All age groups up to 35 to 39 years had a majority (over 50%) of spontaneous deliveries. But the proportion of caesarean deliveries increased with age and accounted for over 50% of deliveries among women aged 45 and over in 2015/16.
For these women, 55% of the caesareans were elective and 45% were emergencies.