Latest trends in having babies

[xoxoxoBruce]

More than 4 million babies are born in the United States each year, and the details of how, when, and where they arrive are constantly shifting.
Super Tuesday: The most popular day for babies to make their entrances? Tuesday, which boasted more than 12,500 births on average. That's 66 percent higher than on Sunday, the slowest day of the week for new babies (in part because doctors don't schedule c-sections and inductions on weekends).

Some like it hot: More newborns arrived in the late summer months of July, August, and September than any other time of the year. Paul Sutton, a demographer for the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics, says it makes sense if you think about what happens nine months earlier in most of the country — the weather gets colder and people spend more time indoors with their sweeties. Also, some people plan births to coincide with summer vacations, especially teachers and other folks who get summers off. November had the fewest birthdays: about 320,000.

Go West: The country's population as a whole is shifting westward, so it's not surprising that the six states showing significant increases in births between 2001 and 2002 (Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, Utah, Texas, and Wyoming) are all west of the Mississippi. Utah's birth rate beat every other state in the Union, with 21 babies born for every 1,000 people. Lowest birth-rate states were Vermont and Maine, with just ten babies born for every 1,000 folks.

Waiting longer: First-time moms were about 25 years old on average — an all-time high in the United States. In 1970, the average age for first-time moms was about 21.

Midlife mothers: Birth rates for women ages 35 to 39 were higher than ever (moms in their mid to late 30s accounted for more than 450,000 babies). The number of moms in their 40s also increased — the birth rate for women ages 40 to 44 has gone up 51 percent since 1990, mostly because of fertility treatments.

More unmarried moms: More than a third of all babies were born to unmarried women, a record high.

Weighing in: Moms-to-be gained 30.5 pounds during their pregnancies, according to the median. (That means that half of moms-to-be gained more than this, half gained less.) This number has stayed constant since 1990.

No-smoking zone: The number of moms who smoked during their pregnancies decreased to about 1 in 10. That's a decline of 42 percent since 1989, when this data was first collected.

Most favor MDs: The vast majority of moms in the United States give birth in hospitals (99 percent) with the help of a physician (91 percent). But women are increasingly choosing other providers — midwives attended 8 percent of births, up from less than 1 percent in the mid-'70s.

C-sections soaring: Cesarean deliveries increased 7 percent from 2001 to 2002. They made up 26 percent of births, the highest rate ever reported in the United States.

Early arrivals: More babies were born prematurely — 12 percent for twins and other multiple births and 7 percent for single births.

Double delight: The number of twins born in the United States continued to rise, increasing to 31 pairs of twins for every 1,000 babies. This rate's skyrocketed 65 percent since 1980.

Dip in triplets: The rate of triplets and higher multiple births dropped slightly to 184 for every 100,000 live births, continuing a three-year decline due in part to improvements in fertility treatments. Still, multiple births have increased by more than 400 percent in the past 20 years.

Boy power: Boys outnumbered girls among new babies, with 1,048 males for every 1,000 females. (That ratio's remained almost the same for the past 50 years.)

Father time: Like women, men are waiting longer to become parents. The median age for new dads is almost 30.