I am in the late stage of pregnancy and am the biggest I’ll ever get.
Walking around town, I see perhaps one pregnant woman every day or two. In comparison, there are many people with babies and toddlers in prams.
Where are all the pregnant people? Surely there is one pregnant person for every baby?
My attempt to explain this observation is something like this:
- The babies I notice are probably between zero and 3 years old.
- Pregnant women are only clearly distinguishable from around 6 months pregnancy.
- The ratio of visible babies/toddlers to pregnant women is therefore 12 (divide 3 years / 36 months of visible babies by 3 months of visible pregnancies). That is, one pregnant person per 12 babies observed.
This seems to be in the right ballpark. Perhaps the incidence of visibly pregnant people is higher in summer because lighter clothing might make it easier for me to notice pregnant bellies.
In the last two or three weeks, I’ve stayed mostly at home. If other pregnant women do the same, then this would reduce our visibility by 25%. Yesterday I went to the pregnancy day clinic at hospital. It was a very busy morning and it was the largest gathering of pregnant people I have ever seen in one place.
