Digital Goa, Sept 4- Goa has the highest level of infertility, followed by other southern Indian states like Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Telangana, states a recent study published in PLOS ONE journal. The study states that age of marriage, biological factors and lifestyle factors are strongly linked to infertility. Goa’s total fertility rate(TFR) was low at 1.3 in 2019–20, states the study. The lifestyle risk factors, including smoking and drinking alcohol and the related disease, that is, diabetes, are also highly prevalent in Goa and some of the southern states which may explain the high levels of infertility in these states, the study claims. The study ‘Surging trends of infertility and its behavioural determinants in India’ is based on the secondary data available after four rounds of the National Family Health Surveys spread from 1992 to 2016 and is conducted by the Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health under Jawaharlal Nehru University and International Institute for Population Sciences in Mumbai. According to the study the fertility rate is higher in South India as compared to North India.
