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During the 1970s the Nordic countries liberalized their abortion laws. We assessed epidemiological trends for induced abortion on all Nordic countries, considered legal similarities and diversities, effects of new medical innovations and changes in practical and legal provisions during the subsequent years. New legislation strengthened surveillance of induced abortion in all countries and mandated hospitals that performed abortions to report to national abortion registers. Published data from the Nordic abortion registers were considered and new comparative analyses done. The data cover complete national populations. After an increase in abortion rates during the first years following liberalization, the general abortion rates stabilized and even decreased in all Nordic countries, especially for women under 25 years. From the mid-1980s higher awareness about pregnancy termination led women to present at an earlier gestational age, which was accelerated by the introduction of medical abortion some years later. Most terminations (80-86%) are now done before the 9th gestational week in all countries, primarily by medical rather than surgical means. Introduction of routine ultrasound screening in pregnancy during the late 1980s, increased the number of 2nd trimester abortions on fetal anomaly indications without an overall increase in the proportion of 2nd relative to 1st trimester abortions. Further refinement of ultrasound screening and non-invasive prenatal diagnostic methods led to a slight increase in the proportion of early 2nd trimester abortions after the year 2000. Country-specific differences in abortion rates have remained stable over the 50 years of liberalized abortion laws.

Bayesian analysis of time-to-event data, usually called survival analysis, has received increasing attention in the last years. In Cox-type models it allows to use information from the full likelihood instead of from a partial likelihood, so that the baseline hazard function and the model parameters can be jointly estimated. In general, Bayesian methods permit a full and exact posterior inference for any parameter or predictive quantity of interest. On the other side, Bayesian inference often relies on Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) techniques which, from the user point of view, may appear slow at delivering answers. In this article, we show how a new inferential tool named integrated nested Laplace approximations can be adapted and applied to many survival models making Bayesian analysis both fast and accurate without having to rely on MCMC-based inference.

Introduction Although perinatal death rates in the Nordic countries are among the lowest in the world, the risk of perinatal death is unevenly distributed across the Nordic countries, despite similarity in health care systems and pregnancy care. Birth registration practices across countries may explain some of the differences. We investigated differences in national registration of perinatal mortality within the Nordic countries and its impact on perinatal mortality according to gestational age. Material and Methods Each country provided information by answering a questionnaire about registration of perinatal deaths. Furthermore, we collected aggregated count data based on Medical Birth Registries (MBR) from all Nordic countries in 2000 to 2021. Perinatal mortality was defined as stillbirth or neonatal death occurring within first 7 days of life. Data were grouped into six groups by gestational age (GA): extremely preterm (>28 + 0 weeks, subdivided into 22 + 0–23 + 6 and 24 + 0–27 + 6), very preterm (GA 28 + 0–31 + 6), moderate preterm (GA 32 + 0–33 + 6), late preterm (GA 34 + 0–36 + 6), term (GA 37 + 0–40 + 6) and late term or post‐term birth (GA ≥ 41 + 0). Perinatal mortality rate and risk ratio with 95% confidence intervals were calculated per country for each gestational age group. For Denmark, separate analyses included and excluded induced abortions. Results The study included 6 343 805 live births, 22 727 stillbirths and 8932 liveborn infants who died within the first week of life after GA 22 + 0. Further 25 057 births were included with GA < 22 + 0, unknown GA and as a result of induced abortion. Overall, perinatal mortality rates decreased during year 2000–2021 in all Nordic countries. After exclusion of induced abortions, the perinatal mortality rate was similar in the five Nordic countries. The perinatal mortality rate for extremely preterm born infants was highest in Denmark, whereas the highest rate among infants born late term/post‐term was in Sweden. Conclusions The perinatal mortality rate in the Nordic countries is still decreasing, especially in the group of extremely preterm born infants. This study supports the need for further standardization of birth registration practices to ensure the validity of international comparisons. Perinatal mortality differs among the Nordic countries, especially in newborns with borderline viability. Registration practice may contribute in relation to induced abortions, live‐births before 22 weeks and twin pregnancies with fetal demise. Standardization and harmonization of definitions are highly recommended.

The Medical Birth Registry of Norway provides national coverage of all births in Norway. In this study trends of smoking at the beginning of pregnancy and the variation of these trends across different sociodemographic groups are analyzed. This knowledge is important for planning interventions both in the general population and specifically among pregnant women. All births registered in Medical Birth Registry of Norway 1999-2014 with information on mothers' smoking status were included in the overall analyses of the smoking trends (806 298). Records from 210 268 births in two time periods 1999-2000 and 2013-2014 were selected, and for the multivariate analyses we used general linear models to provide adjusted risk ratios. The prevalence of maternal smoking at the beginning of pregnancy decreased from 25% to 8% over the 15-year period. Mothers with low, medium, and high education, respectively, had a 46% (RR 0.54, CI 0.52-0.55), 62% (RR 0.38, CI 0.37-0.40), and 80% (RR 0.20, CI 0.19-0.22) reduction in maternal smoking between the two time periods. Similarly, the decline in smoking was greater for mothers who were married or living together (64%; RR 0.36, CI 0.35-0.37) than for single mothers (39%; RR 0.61, CI 0.58-0.64). Immigrants had a lower smoking prevalence than Norwegians in the entire period 1999-2014. The prevalence of smoking during pregnancy in Norway decreased in all population groups, but the relative differences between the educational groups increased from 1999-2000 to 2013-2014. This is a public health concern and a strong contributor to health disparities. Women with low and medium education level and single mothers had the highest smoking prevalence and the lowest decline over the two time periods. These groups constitute 45% of our study population, the relatively high maternal smoking in these groups continues to be of public health concern for maternal and child health.

Stillbirth rates have stalled or increased in some European countries during the last decade. We investigate to what extent time-trends and between-country differences in stillbirth rates are explained by the changing prevalence of advanced maternal age and teenage pregnancies or multiple births. We analysed data on stillbirths and live births by maternal age and multiplicity from 2010 to 2021 in 25 European countries using Kitagawa decomposition to separate rate differences into compositional and rate components. Rates significantly decreased in six countries, but increased in two. Changes in maternal age structure reduced national stillbirth rates by a maximum of 0.04 per 1000 in the Netherlands and increased rates by up to 0.85 in Cyprus. Changes in the prevalence of multiple births decreased rates by up to 0.19 in the Netherlands and increased rates by up to 0.01 across multiple countries. Maternal age differences explained between 0.11 of the below-European average stillbirth rate in Belgium and 0.13 of the above-average rate in Ireland. Excluding Cyprus, differences in multiple births explained between 0.05 of the below-average rate in Malta and 0.03 of the above-average rate in Ireland. For most countries, the increase in advanced-age pregnancies contributed to rising stillbirth rates over time, while reductions in multiples led to decreases in rates. However, large parts of the trends remain unexplained by those factors. By 2021, neither factor explained the differences between countries, due to increased compositional uniformity and declining stillbirth risk for advanced maternal age.