Changes in fertility and the acceptability of pregnancies in northern Finland during the last 20 years.

The acceptability of pregnancies was studied in two birth cohorts in Northern Finland which represent 96% of all births in the region in 1966 (12,068 births) and 99% (9362 births) in 1985-1986. The numbers of women of fertile age in the area during these years were 148,000 and 158,000, so that fertility may be said to have fallen from 81 to 59 per 1000. The pregnancy was wanted in 63.0% of cases and unwanted in 12.2% in 1966, the rest being classified as accepted later. The corresponding figures in 1985-1986 were 91.8% and 1.0%. The latter figures changed very little when maternal age, parity and social class were standardized to the 1966 levels. Acceptability was connected with age, in that the age groups in which childbearing was most frequent, 20-25 years in 1966 and 26-30 years in 1985-1986, had the highest incidence of desired pregnancies. In spite of the fact that there were 1.4 times as many births per woman aged 15-49 years in the former cohort, more wanted children were born to the age group 25-34 years in the latter cohort. The percentage of wanted pregnancies also varied with the woman's parity, social class and marital status. The children in the 1966 cohort were followed until the age of 14 and the incidences of cerebral palsy (CP) and mental retardation (IQ less than 71) were 3.2 times higher among the unwanted children than among the wanted ones.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)