As the economy continues into the toilet, there seems to be a growing push to consider increasing the use of midwives (both hospital and home birth, nurse-midwives and certified professional midwives) as a way to cut down health care costs.
Of course, it's being met with a predictable backlash from doctors screaming about how dangerous home birth is.
In South Dakota, this time around, the doctors won and the house rejected a bill to allow certified professional midwives (the only credential that requires experience in out-of-hospital births) to attend home births. In South Dakota, as in many other states, certified nurse midwives can attend home births if they work with a doctor who approves it—but no doctor will approve it, effectively making the option nonexistant.
But no matter. No one really wants the option anyway. From the AP story: "South Dakota had more than 12,000 live births in 2007, and only 26 of
those babies were born at home, said Doneen Hollingsworth, state Health
Department secretary. Only 19 of those were intended to be home births,
which indicates home births are not supported by most South Dakotans,
she said."
Or, um, that you've made it illegal for the people who want to attend home births to attend them? If people who wanted a home birth were willing to do it alone they wouldn't feel the need for this bill would they? (And they do.)
(Not to mention that at least some of the other seven probably lied about whether their home births were planned to protect midwives working underground.)
Photo by dizznbonn.
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