467 children born out of wedlock in 2012

Between January and June 2012, 467 children were born to unmarried mothers, health minister Joe Cassar said.

Cassar was replying to a parliamentary question tabled by Labour MP Noel Farrugia. In his reply Cassar said that the total number of children born out of wedlock in the first six months of the year stood at 467.

He also noted that 47 of these children were born to non-Maltese nationals.  

In 2011, almost 23% of all births were outside marriage. Since 1990, Maltese society has seen the proportion of marriages decline, while births outside wedlock today have increased radically.

A rarity in 1990, just 1.8% of births were conceived outside marriage. By 1998, Malta was still way below the EU average of 25%, with 7.6% of all births outside marriage. However, by 2010, one in every four live births was outside marriage at 25.5%. The EU's average is 35.1%.

The sharpest increase was registered between 2006 and 2008 when the percentage of children born out of wedlock increased from 22% to 27%.  The numbers peaked at 29% in 2009 only to decline slightly in 2010.

statistics show that 5274 children were born out of wedlock between 2006 and 2010.   In the same timeframe 14934 children were born to married parents.