Rise of the over-40 mothers
Social affairs correspondent
WOMEN over 40 are, for the first time, the only age group with a growing pregnancy rate.
The Office for National Statistics said younger women were putting off having children, with many choosing to prioritise their career. There were 28,744 conceptions to women over 40 in 2016, up from 12,032 in 1990.
While every other group saw pregnancy levels fall, there was a rise in conceptions among the over-40s from 2015 to 2016. The conception rate per 1,000 women has grown from 15.1 in 2015 to 15.4 in 2016, the figures show.
Among all younger women conception rates dropped, with the biggest falls seen in the youngest age groups.
Teenage pregnancies have fallen by more than half in just under 30 years, with 56,111 girls under 20 pregnant in 2016, compared with 113,330 in 1990.
Fewer women in their early 20s are getting pregnant than at any point since 2000, while among women in their late 20s and 30s conception rates
Russia could attempt to sabotage undersea cables that carry power from Europe. Sir Stephen Hillier, Chief of the Air Staff, said the UK relied on space “more than ever” for national security. He added that countries such as Russia were “disregarding” the rules and “exploiting environments in whatever way they feel they can to their advantage”.
Security sources said that the threat from nations such as Russia and North Korea could no longer be tackled by a “traditional” response. The country must also counter propaganda on social media, including “suffocating” hashtags on Twitter to prevent groups such as Isil from getting their message out.
Sources also said the plan included an enhanced role for the BBC World Service to promote British values abroad, ensuring Ofcom shuts down media organisations that fail to hit high British standards and funding units to counter fake news. In a foreword to the National Security Capability Review, the Prime Minister said: “Over the past year in the UK we have witnessed appalling terrorist attacks in London and Manchester. But also a brazen and reckless act of aggression on the streets of Salisbury: attempted murder using an illegal chemical weapon, amounting to an unlawful use of force against the UK.
“Crucially what all of these incidents have made clear is that our national security is conditional on not only the police and security services who work so hard to keep us safe at home, or on the brave men and women of our Armed Forces working tirelessly around the world – but on our ability to mobilise most effectively the full range of our capabilities in concert to respond to the challenges we face.”
A senior Whitehall official said: “It’s sometimes easy to think of national security being the delivery of hardedged direct delivery of capabilities, but actually in the modern era, particularly with social media, in the era of cyber space, those other capabilities, communications, some of the soft power, these are important tools.”