North Macedonia: A 61-year-old woman gives birth to a baby, a record

A 61-year-old woman, whose identity has not been communicated, resorted to in vitro fertilization (IVF), according to the director of the University Clinic of Gynecology and Obstetrics in Skopje, capital of Macedonia. North, Irena Aleksioska Papestiev. The 60-year-old had previously undergone ten IVF attempts, she added. She became the oldest to give birth in the Balkan country, national health authorities announced on Tuesday.

North Macedonia does not impose any age limit on women seeking in vitro fertilization. The mother and newborn left the hospital on Tuesday. The father is 65 years old, according to authorities. Official statistics indicate that the fertility rate in North Macedonia stood at 1.48 children per woman in 2023. Since its independence in 1991, the country has faced massive emigration against a backdrop of a stagnant economy.

The population now numbers only 1.8 million inhabitants, a drop of almost 10% in less than twenty years, according to data from the latest 2021 census.