And half the live births die before they're a month old for five to ten years.

The number of live multiple births has increased 24 percent since 1985.

Few of these reach full term or result in live births.

However, the term "live birth" was in common use long before 1950.

The rate for 1989 was 9.7 per 1,000 live births, down from 9.9 in 1988.

The hospital saw 6,398 day cases and 2,168 live births in the same year.

In 1970 the rate was 17.7 per 1,000 live births.

By last year, the rate was 2.2 abortions per live birth.

A couple in 1925-29 made do with 2.2 live births.

A figure of about 1 in 65,000 live births has been reported for Australia.