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A 70-year-old Ugandan woman has given birth to twins after becoming pregnant through IVF treatment, the hospital where she received treatment said.
Safina Namukwaya became the oldest woman to give birth in Africa after she delivered a baby girl and boy yesterday afternoon, the Women’s Hospital International and Fertility Centre in the Ugandan capital of Kampala said.
Medics at the hospital said the mother and her two babies are doing well after they were delivered via a caesarean.
“This story isn’t just about medical success; it’s about the strength and resilience of the human spirit,” the hospital said.
Ms Namukwaya told the NTV channel that this was her second delivery in three years, after she gave birth to a girl called Sarah in 2020.
The mother said she had suffered some complications and difficulties during her pregnancy, including the father of her children leaving her.
“Men don’t like to hear that you are going to have more than one child,” Ms Namukwaya says. “Even after I was admitted, my man never showed up.”
Ms Namukwaya said in the past she had suffered miscarriages, lost her husband in the 1990s, and faced stigma within her community for not having any children.
While Ms Namukway’s case is a rare one, it’s not the first time a woman has given birth at a more advanced age.
In 2019, Erramatti Mangayamma, from India, gave birth to twins through IVF at the age of 74 – becoming the world’s oldest mother.
Mangayamma, of Andhra Pradesh state, gave birth to two healthy baby girls with her husband of 57 years, Sitarama Rajarao at her side.
The previous record holder for the world’s oldest mother was Bousada de Lara, who was 66 years old when she gave birth to twin baby boys, Christian and Pau, in December 2006.
De Lara admitted lying about her age in order to receive fertility treatment at a private clinic in Los Angeles, for which she paid a reported £30,000.
The babies were delivered prematurely by caesarean section and weighed 3.5 lbs (1.6kg) each.
Omkari Panwar, from the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, claimed to be the oldest mother in the world when she gave birth to twins in 2008. But her claim to have been 70 was not provable.
Britain’s oldest mother is Elizabeth Adeney, from Lindgate in Suffolk, who gave birth to a son in May 2009 at the age of 66.
When a woman goes through the menopause she is no longer able to get pregnant naturally.
But IVF is still possible through the use of eggs frozen earlier in the mother’s life, or eggs from a donor.
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