End of one-child policy in China linked to rise in birth anomalies

By Alice Klein

Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert / Alamy Stock

The rate of birth anomalies in China has increased slightly in the years since it replaced its one-child policy with a two-child policy, perhaps because couples are having second children when they are older.

China’s one-child policy, which began in 1979, was replaced in 2013 with a partial two-child policy that permitted couples to have two children if one or both of them were only children themselves. In 2015, this right was extended to all couples. …