Oh boy, times are changing
Tuesday 23 July 2019
Article published in the Courier Mail: 26 June 2019.
Written by: Antonia O'Flaherty.
Picture: Steve Pohlner
Queenslanders are more likely to give birth to a boy, with males the dominant sex when it comes to newborns, new data reveals.
Between 2015 and 2018, there were only 10 months in which more girls were born than boys at one of the state’s busiest maternity hospitals, Mater Mothers’, figures obtained by The Courier-Mail show.
Overall, the number of boys born at the hospital outnumbered girls by 1308 births. Data from the state’s public hospitals paints a similar picture.
Queensland Health figures show that there were only three months in which more boys than girls were born at public hospitals, with a total of 5297 more boys born over the same four-year period.
Demographer Mark McCrindle said more baby boys was a “biological reality” that keeps the population in more balance, but overall there are more females than males.
“It puts balance into the population, more men die earlier than women, it’s a biological reason for more male births than females,” Mr McCrindle said.