New Zealand 4th, Australia 7th in 2012 Mother's Index
Norway, Iceland and Sweden are the top three best countries for mothers, respectively. New Zealand is three places ahead of Australia, which ranks seventh in the list, followed by Belgium and Ireland. Netherlands and United Kingdom tie in the tenth place. Reuters

Reports of a Mexican woman who made headlines claiming that she was pregnant with nine babies have turned out to be a big hoax, according to Mexican health officials.

Mexico's broadcaster Televisa on Thursday night announced that the woman identified as Karla Vanessa Perez from the northeastern state of Coahuila, which borders Texas was pregnant with six girls and three boys.

Perez told the state-owned news agency Notimex that she was due to deliver her babies on 20 May.

"It's very early to think of names for the babies," Perez told Notimex.

"First I hope that everything goes well," she said.

Reports suggested that Perez conceived after receiving fertility treatment. On hearing the news of her pregnancy, even Mexican health authorities offered to help her.

But now, health officials have found that Perez had lied about her pregnancy. The spokesman for the health ministry of Coahuila state said that the doctors on Friday carried out tests on her and found out that she was not even pregnant, reported Reuters.

Another report from msnbc said that Perez's mother Francisca Castañeda, told Mexican newspaper El Diario de Coahuila that Perez who already has three children had an operation to prevent herself from getting pregnant again.

It was not yet clear why the woman made such false claims.

This is not the first time such false claims have been made. In 2009, an Arabic teacher in Tunisia claimed that she was pregnant with a record breaking 12 babies. She was later found to be lying and an investigation by Tunisian health ministry revealed that she has "psychological problems and is unlikely even to be pregnant", reported the Daily Mail.

But in the same year, an American woman gained media attention when she gave birth to eight babies, six male and two female, through invitrio fertilization. Nadya Suleman, who has been dubbed Octomom, has become a TV personality ever since the birth of her babies. She still holds the world record for delivering most children in a single birth and surviving with them.

Tunisia