A new report shows a significant decline in the number of babies being born in Barbados over the last ten years.

The data are contained in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital’s Annual Perinatal Data Review entitled  “Outcomes of Mothers and New-Borns”.

The data analysis relates only to the QEH but it is noted that the hospital is responsible for more than 90 percent of all births in Barbados.

The report states that there has been a steady, sustained decline in live births over the past 10 years, and projections indicate that by 2031 if present trends continue, there will be approximately only 1live births per year, far less than the approximately three thousand live births recorded in 2012.

On the positive side the rate for still births is 6.2 per cent one thousand total births, which is the lowest recorded rate within the past 10 years and is among the best reported in the Caribbean.