The delivery suites at Mater Dei Hospital were working overtime on September 16, when 23 babies were born – double the predicted amount.

Midwives usually expect to deliver about 12 babies a day in September when, according to trends, births start peaking – nine months after the Christmas and New Year festivities.

This year, 23 of the September births happened to take place on the same day and, as a result, the labour ward could not cope with the workload prompting some expecting mothers to spend time in the children’s ward Fairyland. A spokeswoman for the Health Ministry said this only lasted a few hours and the situation was back to normal by the end of the day.

Every year, births tend to peak in September and reach the highest rate in October.

Statistics obtained from the Health Ministry showed that, last year, the highest number of births was registered in October (391 births), followed by December (383) and September (378).

The figures showed that, in 2013, there were 4,073 deliveries. Since 75 cases were twin births, this resulted in a total of 4,149 births.

There were no cases of triplets or quadruplet deliveries. There were 22 cases of still births and 18 neonatal deaths. Most mothers were between the ages of 30 and 34 (36 per cent) followed by 25 to 29-year-olds (30 per cent).

Malta continued to experience a steady increase in the number of mothers of foreign nationality, increasing from five per cent in 2000 to 13.8 per cent in 2013.

This was mainly due to an increase in mothers from sub-Saharan countries (from 0.1 per cent in 2000 to 2.6 per cent in 2013) followed by Western Europeans (1.8 per cent increasing to 3.7 per cent) and Eastern Europeans (from 0.4 per cent to 2.3 per cent). When it came to type of birth, the majority, 63 per cent, were by normal delivery while 32.3 per cent were caesarean sections. There were 98 mothers reporting making use of assisted reproductive technologies of various forms.

Health   Parliamentary Secretary Chris Fearne said the government had invested in training 15 councillors and nurses to be specifically trained in infertility counselling by the British Infertility Counselling Association.

“The IVF counselling sessions at Mater Dei  are specifically tailored for the requirements and needs of the couples and are provided before, during and after the session,” he said.