The Demographic Consequences of Assisted Reproductive Technologies

Patrick Präg , Melinda Mills (1) , Maria Letizia Tanturri , Christiaan Monden , Gilles Pison (2, 3)

1 Department of Sociology/ICS
2 INED - Institut national d'études démographiques
3 EAE - Eco-Anthropologie et Ethnobiologie

The use of assisted reproductive technology (ART) is widespread, with an estimated five million ART-conceived children born now worldwide. Despite this marked increase in the use of ART, little is known about the demographic consequences. We explore several dimensions of demographic consequences of ART. The proportion of ART-conceived babies varies greatly across countries, and our analyses suggest that ART costs, policies and regulations, and national norms and values are core determinants of these differences. Based on a review of the literature, we conclude that ART has a negligible impact on national fertility rates, thereby suggesting that it is not an effective policy instrument to counter low fertility. Furthermore, we show that the recent increase in twin births in Europe can be attributed to ART usage. A case study of Italy reveals that ART mothers were more likely to deliver prematurely, even when controlling for maternal age.

Mots clés: ART; demographic consequences; fertility rates

Domaines: Démographie; Sciences du Vivant [q-bio]; Biologie de la reproduction; Biotechnologies

Patrick Präg, Melinda Mills, Maria Letizia Tanturri, Christiaan Monden, Gilles Pison. The Demographic Consequences of Assisted Reproductive Technologies. 2017. ⟨hal-02081720⟩