Birth rate soon to rise as pregnancy tests become easier

Berlin (dpo) - Will the storks soon be flying overtime? The Minister for Family Affairs, Franziska Giffey (SPD), intends to take drastic measures to increase Germany’s birth rate, which is currently far too low. As of this year, pregnancy tests are to become far easier. According to studies, women fail nine out of ten pregnancy tests.

Ms Giffey now calculates that the more women who get positive results in their pregnancy tests, the more children are born. Even now, most federal states allow women to take the test as often as they like. Yet, by about the 30th time, many lose patience and stop trying.

One single bar will do in future

Today, Ms Giffey held a press conference and described how her own suffering had prompted her decision: “Many think it is very easy to simply pee on a stick and wait for a few minutes – and yet, it still took me nine attepts to achieve the result I wanted! And I am saying this as the Minister for Family Affairs.”
In future, just one bar will be sufficient on most pregnancy tests. Repeating pregnancy tests after the first child could also be a thing of the past. “Women who have passed the test once can have as many children as they like afterwards”, Ms Giffey says.
However, the SPD’s coalition partner, the CDU/CSU, is yet to be convinced by Ms Giffey’s progress. CDU/CSU politicians worry that lower pregnancy testing standards will primarily lead to an increased birth rate among women with low levels of education and teenagers. Rather than reducing the level of difficulty, the CDU/CSU believes women should practice intensively for their pregnancy test – preferably with their partners.
ssi; picture above: Shutterstock, picture on the right: Claus Michelfelder, CC BY-SA 3.0
Read the German version HERE.