- A Turkish woman is reported to be about to give birth
to her sixth set of triplets, an act of physical endurance which is intriguing
fertility specialists.
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- The woman, Fatma Saygi, 28, lives with her husband, Mehmet,
near the city of Adana in Turkey's Adiyaman province. Eight of her children
from previous pregnancies are said to have survived.
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- Ms Saygi, who says she gave birth to her first three
babies at the age of 18, told Turkish newspapers: "We wanted children
but we didn't really want that many. But Allah has always given us three
at a time.
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- "Me and my husband both are uneducated people. We
can barely feed ourselves. We did not ask for that many kids but God is
giving us triplets all the time."
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- The family lives in a two-room hut in Katha, a village
where Mehmet earns about £12 a week as a musician and singer at weddings.
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- Fatma is not thought to have been taking fertility drugs.
But even if she is about to give birth to her sixth set of triplets, she
will not set a historical precedent. According to the Guinness Book of
Records, an Italian woman, Madalene Granata, bore 15 sets of triplets between
1839 and 1886.
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- The book also notes the case of a Russian woman, known
only as "the wife of Feodor Vassilyev" from the village of Shuya,
who gave birth to 69 children in the 18th century during 27 pregnancies.
The matriarch produced 16 pairs of twins, seven sets of triplets and four
quadruplets.
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- Curiosity has been aroused among fertility experts in
Britain told of the report on Fatma Saygi.
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- Richard Kennedy, a surgeon and the secretary of the British
Fertility Society, was sceptical. He said the chance of producing so many
triplets was extraordinarily remote. The odds of triplets occurring naturally
are about one in 6,400; having one set of triplets slightly lessens the
likelihood of having another set.
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- "It's exceptionally rare if true and about as probable
as an asteroid striking the earth and wiping out humankind," Mr Kennedy
said.
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- But Alison Murdoch, a professor and chair of the British
Fertility Society, said: "It's not impossible, it could happen. Women
produce up to 20 eggs a month but there's a [biological] mechanism which
normally allows only one egg to be fertilised. It's possible in some women
that mechanism may be faulty. We know that twins run in some families.
I would have great sympathy for her."
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- Bill Ledger, also a professor, at the University of Sheffield,
said such fertility might be caused by overproduction of the hormone FSH,
given to women suffering fertility problems. "She may be at the opposite
end of the spectrum of those whom I see in my infertility clinics."
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2003
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- http://www.guardian.co.uk/turkey/story/0,12700,1078852,00.html
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