Live births and stillbirths annual summary statistics, by sex, age of mother, whether within marriage or civil partnership, percentage of non-UK-born mothers, birth rates and births by month and mothers' area of usual residence.

This is a publication on maternity activity in English NHS hospitals. This report examines data relating to delivery and birth episodes in 2023-24, and the booking appointments for these deliveries. This annual publication covers the financial year ending March 2024. Data is included from both the Hospital Episodes Statistics (HES) data warehouse and the Maternity Services Data Set (MSDS). HES contains records of all admissions, appointments and attendances for patients admitted to NHS hospitals in England. The HES data used in this publication are called 'delivery episodes'. The MSDS collects records of each stage of the maternity service care pathway in NHS-funded maternity services, and includes information not recorded in HES. The MSDS is a maturing, national-level dataset. In April 2019, the MSDS transitioned to a new version of the dataset. This version, MSDS v2.0, is an update that introduced a new structure and content - including clinical terminology, in order to meet current clinical practice and incorporate new requirements. It is designed to meet requirements that resulted from the National Maternity Review, which led to the publication of the Better Births report in February 2016. This is the fifth publication of data from MSDS v2.0 and data from 2019-20 onwards is not directly comparable to data from previous years. This publication shows the number of HES delivery episodes during the period, with a number of breakdowns including by method of onset of labour, delivery method and place of delivery. It also shows the number of MSDS deliveries recorded during the period, with a breakdown for the mother's smoking status at the booking appointment by age group. It also provides counts of live born term babies with breakdowns for the general condition of newborns (via Apgar scores), skin-to-skin contact and baby's first feed type - all immediately after birth. There is also data available in a separate file on breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks. For the first time information on 'Smoking at Time of Delivery' has been presented using annual data from the MSDS. This includes national data broken down by maternal age, ethnicity and deprivation. From 2025/2026, MSDS will become the official source of 'Smoking at Time of Delivery' information and will replace the historic 'Smoking at Time of Delivery' data which is to become retired. We are currently undergoing dual collection and reporting on a quarterly basis for 2024/25 to help users compare information from the two sources. We are working with data submitters to help reconcile any discrepancies at a local level before any close down activities begin. A link to the dual reporting in the SATOD publication series can be found in the links below. Information on how all measures are constructed can be found in the HES Metadata and MSDS Metadata files provided below. In this publication we have also included an interactive Power BI dashboard to enable users to explore key NHS Maternity Statistics measures. The purpose of this publication is to inform and support strategic and policy-led processes for the benefit of patient care. This report will also be of interest to researchers, journalists and members of the public interested in NHS hospital activity in England. Any feedback on this publication or dashboard can be provided to enquiries@nhsdigital.nhs.uk, under the subject “NHS Maternity Statistics”.

Annual live births in England and Wales by age of mother and father, type of registration, median interval between births, number of previous live-born children and National Statistics Socio-economic Classification (NS-SEC).

This statistical release makes available the most recent monthly data on NHS-funded maternity services in England, using data submitted to the Maternity Services Data Set (MSDS). This is the latest report from the newest version of the data set, MSDS.v.2, which has been in place since April 2019, and the second to include provisional data - see the above change notice for more information. The new data set was a significant change which added support for key policy initiatives such as continuity of carer, as well as increased flexibility through the introduction of new clinical coding. This was a major change, so data quality and coverage has initially reduced from the levels seen in earlier publications. We expect the completeness to continue to get better over time, and are looking at ways of supporting improvements. This month two new measures have been included in this publication for the first time: Saving Babies Lives Element 2 Outcome Indicators i and ii. These measures are the proportion of babies below the 3rd birthweight centile born after 37 weeks gestation, and the proportion of babies born after 39 weeks gestation below the 10th birthweight centile. This new data can be found in the Measures file available for download and further information on these new measures can be found in the accompanying Metadata file. The data derived from SNOMED codes is being used in some measures such as those for smoking at booking and birth weight, and others will follow in later publications. SNOMED data is also included in some of the published Clinical Quality Improvement Metrics (CQIMs), where rules have been applied to ensure measure rates are calculated only where data quality is high enough. System suppliers are at different stages of developing their new solution and delivering that to trusts. In some cases, this has limited the aspects of data that could be submitted to NHS Digital. To help Trusts understand to what extent they met the Clinical Negligence Scheme for Trusts (CNST) Maternity Incentive Scheme (MIS) Data Quality Criteria for Safety Action 2, we have produced a CNST Scorecard Dashboard showing trust performance against this criteria. This dashboard can be accessed via the link below. These statistics are classified as experimental and should be used with caution. Experimental statistics are new official statistics undergoing evaluation. More information about experimental statistics can be found on the UK Statistics Authority website. Please note that the percentages presented in this report are based on rounded figures and therefore may not total to 100%.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) publishes data on the number of live births by the mother's country of birth in England and Wales each year. Every time a birth is registered in England and Wales both parents are required to state their places of birth on their child's birth certificate, and this information is then collated to produce these statistics. In order to make it easier to look at what these data tell us about births in London, and how these have been changing over time, the GLA Demography team has extracted the data which relate to London from the main ONS dataset since 2001 and presented it here in an easily accessible format. For more information about how the ONS produces these statistics, please visit their website: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/livebirths For more information about how we extracted these data and created this report, please this project's Github repository: https://github.com/Greater-London-Authority/births_by_mothers_country_of_birth Since 2001, the number of live births being recorded in London has changed from 104,162 to 106,129 births per year. The proportion of births which were to mothers who had been born outside the UK has changed from 43% in 2001 to 60% in the most recent year (2024). In 2024, the region of origin which supplied the largest number of births to non-UK-born mothers in London was Asia with 27,269, followed by the Africa which provided 10,696. The region of origin which has seen the largest change since 2001 is the Asia, which went from 13,489 live births per year in 2001 to 27,269 in 2024. In 2024, the region with the largest number of births to non-UK-born mothers was London with 63,460 live births (% of all live births in London). By contrast, the region with the lowest number of births to non-UK-born mothers was the Wales with 4,330 live births to non-UK-born mothers, which only represented 16% of all live births in that region. The data shows that London accounted for 31% of all the births to non-UK-born mothers in England and Wales in 2024, which was a far higher proportion than any other region. These data also highlight a couple of other interesting comparisons. Firstly, despite being the second largest region in England and Wales in terms of population, London is not the region with the largest number of births to UK-born mothers. Secondly, London is the only region to have relatively large numbers of mothers from every region of the world according to the way in which the ONS has categorised them, including Africa, non-EU European countries (such as Turkey and Russia) and the 'Rest of the World' (which includes the Americas and Oceania). The data comparing London with England & Wales excluding London and England & Wales as a whole (including London) is provided in the table below:

Annual UK and constituent country figures for births, deaths, marriages, divorces, civil partnerships and civil partnership dissolutions.

Live births in the UK by area of usual residence of mother. The tables contain summary data for local authorities and local health boards (within Wales) including figures by age of mother.

Live births by local authority of usual residence of mother, General Fertility Rates and Total Fertility Rates. The general fertility rate (GFR) is the number of live births per 1,000 women aged 15-44. Rates are based on the most up-to-date population estimates. The General Fertility Rate (GFR) is the number of live births per 1,000 women aged 15-44. The Total Fertility Rate (TFR) is the average number of live children that a group of women would bear if they experienced the age-specific fertility rates of the calendar year in question throughout their childbearing lifespan. The TFR has been calculated using the number of live births and the mid-year population estimates (sub-nationally) and the projections (nationally) for women by single year of age. This generally produces a better match of births to those at risk of having births. However, local authority level population estimates are only considered reliable in five-year age bands. Thus, especially in small local authorities, it should be noted that rates computed using single year of age data may produce spurious results. City of London has been grouped with Hackney after 2004. Read more on the ONS website ONS have also produces birth statistics for mid-year for small areas.

This is a publication on maternity activity in English NHS hospitals. This report examines data relating to delivery and birth episodes in 2021-22, and the booking appointments for these deliveries. This annual publication covers the financial year ending March 2022. Data is included from both the Hospital Episodes Statistics (HES) data warehouse and the Maternity Services Data Set (MSDS). HES contains records of all admissions, appointments and attendances for patients admitted to NHS hospitals in England. The HES data used in this publication are called 'delivery episodes'. The MSDS collects records of each stage of the maternity service care pathway in NHS-funded maternity services, and includes information not recorded in HES. The MSDS is a maturing, national-level dataset. In April 2019 the MSDS transitioned to a new version of the dataset. This version, MSDS v2.0, is an update that introduced a new structure and content - including clinical terminology, in order to meet current clinical practice and incorporate new requirements. It is designed to meet requirements that resulted from the National Maternity Review, which led to the publication of the Better Births report in February 2016. This is the third publication of data from MSDS v2.0 and data from 2019-20 onwards is not directly comparable to data from previous years. This publication shows the number of HES delivery episodes during the period, with a number of breakdowns including by method of onset of labour, delivery method and place of delivery. It also shows the number of MSDS deliveries recorded during the period, with breakdowns including the baby's first feed type, birthweight, place of birth, and breastfeeding activity; and the mothers' ethnicity and age at booking. There is also data available in a separate file on breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks. The count of Total Babies includes both live and still births, and previous changes to how Total Babies and Total Deliveries were calculated means that comparisons between 2019-20 MSDS data and later years should be made with care. The MethodfDelivery measure counting babies has been replaced by the DeliveryMethodBabyGroup measure which counts deliveries, and the smoking at booking and folic acid status measures have been renamed - these changes have been made to better align this annual publication with the Maternity Services Monthly Statistics publication. Information on how all measures are constructed can be found in the HES Metadata and MSDS Metadata files provided below. In this publication we have also included an interactive Power BI dashboard to enable users to explore key NHS Maternity Statistics measures. The purpose of this publication is to inform and support strategic and policy-led processes for the benefit of patient care. This report will also be of interest to researchers, journalists and members of the public interested in NHS hospital activity in England. Any feedback on this publication or dashboard can be provided to enquiries@nhsdigital.nhs.uk, under the subject “NHS Maternity Statistics”.

Annual live births in England and Wales by sex, birthweight, gestational age, ethnicity and month. Maternities by place of birth and with multiple births. Stillbirths by age of parents and calendar quarter.

A live birth is a baby showing signs of life at birth. This dataset shows the latest live births by Ward.

Modelled estimates of annual live births by year ending date. Official birth estimates from ONS are considered very accurate, but the lag between the end of the period covered and the publication of estimates is typically 9-12 months. To gain a more timely indication of birth trends, the GLA Demography team produces modelled estimates of annual births based on counts of infants registered with GP practices. Modelled birth estimates can be produced with the same frequency and latency that NHS Digital publishes patient count data - currently this is monthly and with a lag of 1-2 weeks. The approach used to generate the modelled birth estimates was originally described in this 2016 technical note. The methodology relies on the correlation between the count of persons age 0 (i.e. yet to reach their first birthday) on the patient register and resident in an area with the number of births that have taken place in that area over the preceding year. The data used to create these modelled birth estimates are: Modelled estimates of patient counts by age, sex, and local authority of residence Official estimates of annual live births by local authority of residence A respository of the code used to generate the modelled birth estimates is available on GitHub. The repository's ReadMe provides more information about the methodology used to produce the estimates as well as a summary analysis of their past accuracy. The outputs cover a range of geographies in England. Within London there is variation in how annual births are predicted to have changed since the latest official estimates. The map below shows the percentage change between the latest official births estimates (01 Jan 2025) and the latest GLA modelled births estimate (01 Oct 2025) for London Boroughs. File contents Files containing the outputs from this modelling process are available for download below. The downloads contain official ONS annual births estimates between 01 Jul 1992 and 01 Jan 2025, interpolated estimates at monthly intervals between official estimates, and predictions of annual births up to 01 Oct 2025. Predicted data are given alongside the upper and lower bounds of the 95% prediction interval. The data are given for local authority districts, regions, country, and international territorial levels ITL2 in England. These data are not currently split by sex. The following are example rows to show the format of the csv data file downloads. actual_and_predicted_births.csv gss_code gss_name geography sex date type annual_births interval_lower interval_upper … … … … … … … … … E09000028 Southwark LAD23 persons 2024-12-01 interpolated 3298.9 NA NA E09000028 Southwark LAD23 persons 2025-01-01 actual 3256 NA NA E09000028 Southwark LAD23 persons 2025-02-01 predicted 3287.8 3202.7 3373 … … … … … … … … … E09000028 Southwark LAD23 persons 2025-10-01 predicted 3184 3102 3265.9 birth_gp_ratios.csv gss_code gss_name geography sex date ratio ratio_lower ratio_upper ratio_type gp_count actual_births … … … … … … … … … … … E09000028 Southwark LAD23 persons 2024-12-01 1.065 NA NA interpolated 3098.2 NA E09000028 Southwark LAD23 persons 2025-01-01 1.066 NA NA actual 3054.5 3256 E09000028 Southwark LAD23 persons 2025-02-01 1.068 1.04 1.096 predicted 3078.6 NA … … … … … … … … … … … E09000028 Southwark LAD23 persons 2027-07-01 1.063 1.034 1.091 predicted NA NA The plots.zip download contains png files of plots showing the actual and predicted annual births for each geographic area in the same format as the actual and predicted annual live births plot for London above. There are 3 plots for each different area which give different starting dates for the official estimates backseries to span a total of either 5, 10 or 15 years.

This is the number of new enterprises, also known as business births, in the area for the quarter. Business creations are new enterprise entries in the Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR). Enterprises are added to the IDBR when a new business is identified from administrative sources (usually the Value Added Tax (VAT) or Pay As You Earn (PAYE) systems).

An enterprise can be defined as the smallest combination of legal units that is an organisational unit producing goods or services, that benefits from a certain degree of autonomy in decision-making, especially for the allocation of its current resources. An enterprise carries out one or more activities at one or more locations. An enterprise may also be a sole legal unit.

Business creations for this data are based on the date on which the action occurs on the IDBR. Data is extracted from the IDBR quarterly and may be subject to revision. The date a business is added to the IDBR is generally on the same day, or within a few days, of the legal creation of the business as a company with Companies House. However, this can be several weeks after the effective birth of the business.

An unspecified geography category has been introduced to deal with the distorting effect of multiple registrations at the same site. These apply where there are 250 plus creations or closures at the same postcode. Any creations or closures that happen at one of these postcodes are taken out of their geography and placed into the unspecified category. These cases still count towards the UK totals and may account for up to 4 per cent of the overall total.

Figures for each period are rounded independently to the nearest 5 using controlled rounding. The ONS statistics presented are "Experimental Statistics", so care needs to be taken when interpreting them. Care should be taken interpreting figures for a single period, therefore the annual business demography publication is a more accurate reflection of business births and deaths.

Data is Powered by LG Inform Plus and automatically checked for new data on the 3rd of each month.

A live birth is a baby showing signs of life at birth. This dataset shows the latest live births by Lower Super Output Area (LSOA).The ward is based on a best fit lookup from the supplied LSOA.

Live births, stillbirths and linked infant deaths for babies born in a given calendar year in England and Wales, and associated risk factors including gestational age, birthweight, mother's age at birth and ethnicity.

The National Records of Scotland publish Births by Sex annually and this dataset shows an extract for the Stirling Council area from the year 2000 onwards. Provisional data are published on a quarterly basis around 10 weeks after the end of the quarter. These annual figures represent the final figures for the calendar year and supersede the provisional weekly, monthly and quarterly figures already published. Information about (for example) the sources, methods, definitions and reliability of these statistics is available from the following NRS web site pages:general background information on Vital Events statistics andbackground information on points which are specific to statistics about deaths. These figures are directly comparable with those for other parts of the UK, there are no significant differences across the UK in how Vital Events data are collected and processed.More detailed commentary on the final Vital Events statistics for calendar years as a whole can be found in the relevant chapters of Scotland's Population - the Registrar General's Annual Review of Demographic Trends.

This dataset presents the rate of delivery episodes where the mother is aged under 18 years. It is based on pooled data over five years and includes only those births that occurred in NHS hospitals or similar institutions, excluding deliveries at home, in private hospitals, or other non-standard settings. The indicator provides insight into teenage pregnancy trends and supports public health efforts aimed at reducing early motherhood.

Rationale

Reducing the number of births to teenage mothers is a key public health objective, as early motherhood is often associated with poorer health, educational, and economic outcomes for both mother and child. This indicator helps monitor progress in reducing teenage pregnancies and informs targeted interventions.

Numerator

The numerator includes the total number of maternal episodes where the mother is aged between 12 and 17 years, and the episode type is recorded as a delivery (type '2') or other delivery event (type '5'). Deliveries that occurred at a domestic address, in a private hospital, or in another institution are excluded. Data is sourced from the Secondary Uses Service (Inpatient Data Set).

Denominator

The denominator includes the total number of maternal episodes with a valid maternal age, where the episode type is '2' (delivery) or '5' (other delivery event), and the place of delivery is not a domestic address, private hospital, or other institution. Data is also sourced from the Secondary Uses Service (Inpatient Data Set).

Caveats

Deliveries that occur at home or in private hospitals are not included in this dataset. Additionally, sub-national counts of 8 and above are rounded to the nearest 5 for disclosure control. The data is pooled over five years to ensure statistical robustness.

External references

For more information, visit the Public Health England Fingertips Profile.

Localities ExplainedThis dataset contains data based on either the resident locality or registered locality of the patient, a distinction is made between resident locality and registered locality populations:Resident Locality refers to individuals who live within the defined geographic boundaries of the locality. These boundaries are aligned with official administrative areas such as wards and Lower Layer Super Output Areas (LSOAs).Registered Locality refers to individuals who are registered with GP practices that are assigned to a locality based on the Primary Care Network (PCN) they belong to. These assignments are approximate—PCNs are mapped to a locality based on the location of most of their GP surgeries. As a result, locality-registered patients may live outside the locality, sometimes even in different towns or cities.This distinction is important because some health indicators are only available at GP practice level, without information on where patients actually reside. In such cases, data is attributed to the locality based on GP registration, not residential address.

Click here to explore more from the Birmingham and Solihull Integrated Care Partnerships Outcome Framework.

Annual live births, stillbirths, maternities, and fertility rates in England and Wales by factors including registration, place of birth, and deprivation.

Introduction to fertility estimates

Fertility refers to the number of live births within an individual or group, influenced by a combination of biological, social, cultural, and economic factors.

There are several ways to describe fertility rates, but two of the most commonly used are Age-Specific Fertility Rates (ASFR) and Total Fertility Rates (TFR).

Age-specific fertility rates (ASFR) measure the number of births per woman within specific age groups. For example, in England, the peak childbearing age is currently 32, with an ASFR of 0.107, meaning 107 babies were born for each 1,000 women aged 32.

Total fertility rate (TFR) is a commonly used measure of overall fertility calculated as the sum of all age-specific fertility rates across all reproductive age groups. It represents the average number of children that a woman would have if she were to experience current age-specific fertility rates over the course of her life. For 2023, we estimate the TFR in Inner London to have been 1.16 compared to 1.54 in Outer London, and 1.41 for England as whole.

About these estimates

The estimates published here were produced by the GLA for use in analysis and as inputs to population projections. These data include annual estimates for all local authority districts and regions in England and Wales from 1993 onward of:

• Total Fertility Rates
• Age-Specific Fertility Rates by single year of age (15 to 49)

The GLA is making these estimates and the code used to create them as a resource for analysts and researchers working to understand local birth trends. We welcome feedback and suggestions from the community for how these data could be improved or made more useful.

The code used to produce these estimates is available on GitHub. All the requirements and information necessary to recreate the estimates can be found in the README file. This repository also includes some examples of code for plotting age-specific and total fertility rates across local authorities and periods of interest.

The Office for National Statistics also publishes fertility rates for local authority districts and higher geographies. Age-specific fertility rates are published by five-year age groups and for 2013 onward. These data are available to download from Nomis.

Note: There will be differences between the rates published by the GLA and those available from ONS. These are because the GLA:

• models rates for individual ages 15 to 19 and 40 to 49 from aggregate data
• applies smoothing to age specific rates
• uses population denominators for 2002 to 2020 that differ from the official mid-year estimates used by ONS.

Data and methods

The data used to calculate fertility rate estimates are:

• ONS calendar year births by age of mother from 1993
• ONS mid-year population estimates from 1991 - 2000
• GLA estimates components of change modelled backseries from 2000

Raw age-specific fertility rates are calculated by dividing the number of births in a calendar year by the population of women the same age at the mid-point of that year.

Smoothed rates, covering individual ages from 15 to 49 are produced by fitting a series of parametric curves to the raw fertility rates.

Age-specific fertility rates are summed across all ages to obtain total fertility rates.

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