More Filipinas marrying early

FILIPINAS aged 15 to 49 who got married at least once in their lives have reached 17.93 million, according to the local statistics agency.

Their median age went up by 0.1 from the 2010 census to 21.6 years.

It said 2.25 million women got married at 20, followed by 18-year-old women at 1.7 million and 1.61 million women whose ages were not reported.

The children born to these women had reached 38.74 million, with an average of 2.2 children per woman.

The Calabarzon region had the highest number of children born at 5.57 million. It was followed by Central Luzon with 4.26 million and Metro Manila with 4.11 million children, it said. — Bernadette Therese M. Gadon