More about twins In Australia, twins happen in 1 in every 80 births. This means that 1 in 40 Australians is a twin.
The rate keeps rising for (naturally) two big reasons. More twins are being born now than ever before. Parents are increasingly using in-vitro fertilization and deciding to have children later in life. The twin rate could continue to go up as more nations push these factors higher.
It has been widely assumed that there has been an increase in twins over the years, largely attributed to fertility treatments. But the increase in the multiple birth rate means not just more twins, but also higher order multiples, such as triplets, quadruplets and the like.
The number of multiple births in Australia each year is small and has remained relatively stable at around 2-3% of all births (from 3.1% (9,442) of births in 2010 to 2.9% (8,469) of births in 2020).
Head of the AIHW's National Perinatal Statistics Unit, Dr Elizabeth Sullivan, says the rise in twin births can be attributed to a number of factors, including delay in childbearing, older mothers, use of fertility drugs and assisted reproductive technology.
High parity – Having one or more previous pregnancies, especially a multiple pregnancy, increases the chances of having multiples. Race – African-American women are more likely to have twins than any other race. Asian and Native Americans have the lowest twinning rates.
According to the Office on Women's Health , women who are aged 30 years or older are more likely to conceive twins. The reason for this is that women of this age are more likely than younger women to release more than one egg during their reproductive cycle.
Twins are more or less equally likely to be female or male. Contrary to popular belief, the incidence of twins doesn't skip generations.
Factors that increase the chance of twins include: consuming high amounts of dairy foods, being over the age of 30, and conceiving while breastfeeding. Many fertility drugs including Clomid, Gonal-F, and Follistim also increase the odds of a twin pregnancy.
Everyone has the same chance of having identical twins: about 1 in 250. Identical twins do not run in families. But there are some factors that make having non-identical twins more likely: non-identical twins are more common in some ethnic groups, with the highest rate among Nigerians and the lowest among Japanese.
Are twins hereditary? Yes, some types of twins are hereditary, meaning that twins run in families. Heredity on the mother's side ups a couple's odds of conceiving fraternal twins. Fraternal twins are two babies from two different eggs that were released from the ovaries simultaneously.
In fact, one British study tested ESP potential among identical twins and found that they were correct about 25% of the time, the same as any other siblings. There is one particular power though which twins possess, longevity. Fraternal twins live longer than singletons and identical twins longer still.
Asian Americans and Native Americans have the lowest rates for twins. White people assigned female at birth have the highest rate of higher-order multiple births (triplets or more).
Vietnam was the country with the fewest twins (6.2 per 1,000 births) and Benin was the country with the most (27.9 per 1,000). Over time, some of these developing countries saw increases in twins, but some saw decreases and some stayed the same, with any changes tending to be small.
The first wife (died ante 1770), of Feodor Vassilyev (b. 1707–c. 1782), a peasant from Shuya, Russia, gave birth to 16 sets of twins.
They're also more likely to have health problems later in life, like high blood pressure. More than half of twins and nearly all higher order multiples weigh less than they should at birth.
It's equally unsurprising that a Danish study found that twins are less likely to get married than non-twins. As twins have a partner from birth, the study suggests that they may not have the same desire for marriage as singletons.
If twins are a boy and a girl, clearly they are fraternal twins, as they do not have the same DNA. A boy has XY chromosomes and a girl has XX chromosomes.
While you are breastfeeding/chestfeeding, your level of luteinizing hormone (LH) and prolactin are higher. LH has a direct effect on ovulation while prolactin is a pregnancy hormone. This combination may increase the chances of conceiving twins while breastfeeding/chestfeeding.
Most twins are born healthy. A twin pregnancy can mean a higher chance of health complications so you'll need extra check-ups. Twins that share a placenta or inner sac need to be checked more closely. It's good to know whether twins are fraternal or identical for health reasons later in life.
The notion that twins always skip a generation is also a myth. The illusion may have arisen because men who inherit the gene from their mothers are unaffected by it ( they do not ovulate), but can still pass it on to their daughters, who, in turn, will have an increased likelihood of conceiving twins.
In Nigeria's southwestern city of Igbo-Ora, there is an unusually abundant number of twins - so much so that it is the west African nation's self-proclaimed "twin capital". "Nearly every family here has twins or other multiple births," says local chief Jimoh Titiloye.