Midwife organization head says establishment conspiring against home births

Tuesday, January 04, 2011 by: Jonathan Benson, staff writer
Tags: home births, midwives, health news

(NaturalNews) The maternity services sector of the U.K. public health system is greatly strained and "almost near breaking point," according to Cathy Warwick, head of the Royal College of Midwives (RCM). But the government is trying to tarnish the safety and viability of home births, an alternative method of giving birth that not only relieves some of this strain but also offers pregnant women a non-hospital birthing option.

"We want to make sure that all women know that the choice of a home birth is available to them," explained Warwick in a public message. "We feel that there is a concerted and calculated backlash by sectors of the establishment against home birth and midwife-led care."

Some groups have falsely suggested to the public that using midwives for home births is not the safest way to bear children, says Warwick. However, there are a record 2,493 midwives in training and not enough currently to provide needed services for women, which indicates that many British women still prefer to have home births.

Warwick is calling on a massive reorganization of U.K. maternity services to give more women the option to have home births. She noted in a statement that the current U.K. government promised pre-election to provide maternity services for at least 3,000 additional midwives. So she is encouraging the administration to hold true to these promises.

In the U.S., the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) is opposed to home births because the organization says it believes hospital births are safer. But a 2009 study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal disagrees, having found that home births are equal to or safer than hospital births (https://www.naturalnews.com/026999_home_birth...).

Sources for this story include:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-12070665

http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/rapidpdf/cmaj.081869v...