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A new study bolsters the argument that fertility doctors should transfer just one embryo at a time when they are trying to help women give birth.

Data on 233,850 infants born over a 10-year period show that twins, triplets and other “higher order multiples” are more likely to die prematurely and to require costly medical care compared to babies born as singletons.

In a study published Monday in the journal JAMA Pediatrics, researchers reviewed birth, hospital and death records for infants born in Western Australia between 1993 and 2003, following each child for at least five years.

Compared with the infants born solo, twins were 3.4 times more likely to be stillborn and 6.4 times more likely to die within 28 days of birth. Those risks were far greater for the higher-order multiples: 9.6 times and 36.7 times respectively.

The average hospital costs in the first five years of life rose dramatically with the size of the delivery: $2,730 for singletons, $8,993 for twins and $24,411 for triplets and up. The added expenses of multiple births were concentrated in the...