Rate of newborns under one kilo doubles

The rate of babies born weighing under one kilo has doubled in the last 20 years, the Federal Statistics Office has announced.

In a report on stillbirth and infant mortality rates, the office said the proportion of such tiny babies had gone from 0.2 per cent of live births to 0.4 per cent.

The rise can be explained by the increase in the average age of mothers and in the increase in the rate of multiple births, which is partly due to the use of assisted reproduction.

Babies born weighing less than a kilo face a very high death rate despite major advances in neo-natal care, the report said. One in three will die before reaching their first birthday.

For babies born before 28 weeks gestation the death rate is 50 per cent.

Despite the marked increase in high-risk births, the stillbirth and infant mortality rates remained more or less stable between 2003 and 2010, the statistics office said.

In 2010 the stillbirth rate was 4.3 per thousand births while the infant mortality rate (death in the first year of life) was 3.8 deaths per thousand live births.

Every year Switzerland registers between around 340 stillbirths and up to 330 deaths of infants under one year, the figures show.