The rate of triplet and higher-order births rose rapidly during the 1980s and 1990s, but that trend has ended.

According to a new report from the National Center for Health Statistics, the rate of triplet and higher-order births plunged 41 percent from 1998 to 2014. More than 90 percent of these births are triplets.

Almost all of the decline occurred among women 25 and older, particularly women 45 and older, a drop of 67 percent to 769.9 per 100,000 births from 2,326. Non-Hispanic white women had the largest drop, about 46 percent.

But rates of triplet or higher-order births were still 57 percent higher in this group than among non-Hispanic blacks, and more than twice as high as the rate among Hispanic women.