Pasted between adverts for chewing gum and the latest Hollywood blockbuster, a series of adverts on the tube are currently flogging ‘fertility for the over-40s’. They come at a time when Professor Dame Sally Davies, Chief Medical Officer for England, has recently commented on Britain’s attitude to fertility.
Davies said she was concerned about the ‘steady shift’ towards women choosing to postpone starting a family until their late 30s and early 40s, reducing their chance of conception, and increasing their medical risks. ‘We all assume we can have children later but actually we may not be able to,’ she said.
Why do women continue to assume they can have children at whatever age they like? Almost all the evidence suggests that it’s far healthier to have a child in your younger years. Looked at from a biological view, we are animals, designed to reproduce. There is a certain time frame in which to do this (the dreaded ‘ticking clock’) and after that, your time’s up.
For women, peak fertility is in their early 20s, and drops considerably after the age of 35.
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