According to a hospital in Uganda, a 70-year-old woman gave birth to twins after undergoing IVF therapy.
Safina Namukwaya gave birth to a boy and a girl via a caesarean section at a fertility clinic in Kampala, Uganda’s capital.
Ms. Namukwaya, one of the oldest women to give birth, described the event as a “miracle” to local media.
The hospital commended her, saying it is about more than “medical success; it is about the strength and resilience of the human spirit.”
According to Dr. Edward Tamale Sali of the Women’s Hospital International and Fertility Centre (WHI&FC), the mother used a donor egg and her partner’s sperm for the in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) process.
At 31 weeks, the kids were delivered prematurely and placed in incubators. Dr. Sali describes them as “stable” at the moment.
Following IVF therapy, a 73-year-old Indian woman gave birth to twins in 2019.
“We’ve achieved the extraordinary – delivering twins to Africa’s oldest mother aged 70!” the WHI&FC posted on its Facebook page.
Ms Namukwaya told Uganda’s Daily Monitor that her pregnancy had been challenging since her spouse had abandoned her when he discovered she was expecting twins.
“Men don’t like to be told that you are carrying more than one child. Ever since I was admitted here, my man has never showed up,” she said.
Ms Namukwaya is having her second child in three years. In 2020, she gave birth to a daughter.
She stated that she desired children after being teased for being childless.
“I looked after people’s children and saw them grow up and leave me alone. I wondered who would take care of me when I grow old,” she is quoted as saying.
Women often enter menopause between the ages of 45 and 55. Fertility declines at this period, but breakthroughs in medicine have enabled them to give birth.
IVF is one of various methods. During the procedure, an egg is extracted from a woman’s ovaries and fertilized in a laboratory using sperm.
The fertilized egg, known as an embryo, is subsequently implanted in the womb of a woman to grow and develop.
