In vitro fertilization (IVF) births totaled 10,236 in 2018, a record and an increase of 646 from a year earlier, National Health Insurance Administration (NHIA) data showed.
With 180,656 babies born in 2018, about one in every 18 liveborn infants was from the IVF procedure, the data showed.
Taiwanese Society for Reproductive Medicine executive council member Chen Hsin-fu (陳信孚), who is a physician at National Taiwan University Hospital’s Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, said that the situation in Taiwan is similar to the global trend.
Former society director Lee Hsin-yang (李新揚), who is superintendent of Usoon Fertility Center, said that IVF babies are as healthy as naturally conceived babies, so couples who are having fertility issues should seek medical advice as early as possible.
IVF combines sperm and an ovum outside the body, with resulting zygotes placed in the uterus to facilitate pregnancy.
As more people are getting married later and more women are working, the average age of mothers giving birth for the first time has risen from 29.83 in 2008 to 32.12 last year, with more than one-third aged 35 or older.
The average age of women who received IVF treatment was 32.7 in 1998, rising to 37.3 in 2018, with most of the women being about 35 years old, the NHIA data showed.
Pregnancy and live birth rates decrease with increasing age of the woman. About 25 percent of women who undergo IVF give birth successfully if the recipient is 34 years old, but the rate drops to about 10 percent if the recipient is 40 or older, the data showed.
Ovarian problems are the cause in more than 30 percent of female infertility cases.
There were 2,317 live-born IVF children in 1998, increasing to more than 10,236 in 2018, with the sex ratio being 109 males per 100 females, the data showed.
More than 70 percent were single pregnancies, the data showed.
Chen Li-chuan (陳麗娟), director of the Health Promotion Administration’s Maternal and Child Health Division, said that couples who are trying to conceive should do so as early as possible, with the preferred age range being 25 to 35, while IVF treatment is best conducted before the woman is 34.
Young married couples should do fertility planning, Chen Li-chuan said, adding that if they are not able to get pregnant within a year, they might have a fertility issue, which might be because of the man or the woman, so “they should seek medical attention together.”
Meanwhile, data from the Executive Yuan’s Gender Equality Committee showed that more than 80 percent of women aged 30 to 39 were working last year, so oocyte cryopreservation has become more common.
As the freezing technology has improved, there is a rising trend of women undergoing the procedure, Chen Hsin-fu said.
The procedure is best done before the woman reaches 35 years old, but it is not recommended for women under 30 years old, unless they have a family history of premature ovarian failure or are about to undergo chemotherapy, he said.
Tri-Service General Hospital Gynecology and Obstetrics Department physician Liu Yung-liang (劉勇良) said that fertility rates from oocyte cryopreservation depend on the age of the woman as well as her health.
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) mention of Taiwan’s official name during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Wednesday was likely a deliberate political play, academics said. “As I see it, it was intentional,” National Chengchi University Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies professor Wang Hsin-hsien (王信賢) said of Ma’s initial use of the “Republic of China” (ROC) to refer to the wider concept of “the Chinese nation.” Ma quickly corrected himself, and his office later described his use of the two similar-sounding yet politically distinct terms as “purely a gaffe.” Given Ma was reading from a script, the supposed slipup
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
The bodies of two individuals were recovered and three additional bodies were discovered on the Shakadang Trail (砂卡礑) in Taroko National Park, eight days after the devastating earthquake in Hualien County, search-and-rescue personnel said. The rescuers reported that they retrieved the bodies of a man and a girl, suspected to be the father and daughter from the Yu (游) family, 500m from the entrance of the trail on Wednesday. The rescue team added that despite the discovery of the two bodies on Friday last week, they had been unable to retrieve them until Wednesday due to the heavy equipment needed to lift