(( VaginaPagina ))

Well, as I understand this, Virginia does not recognize Certified Professional Midwives - who generally are the ones attending at these home births - as medical professionals (http://www.childbirthsolutions.com/articles/pregnancy/safebirth/index.php).

I also question the need to report the birth within 12 hours - that seems awfully stringent. Why not 24? Or 48? Remember, these women will be charged with committing a crime for not reporting in the time period allotted.

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sabbysteg.livejournal.com

If they report the birth, there is no problem. Don't midwives usually report it somehow? And some midwives also have medical certification.

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tigerfemme had a great response in the comment right below yours (http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?journal=vaginapagina&itemid=607231&thread=4865791).

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Having given birth, I'm going to say that reporting it was not what was at the forefront of either mine, or the baby's father's mind, within the first 12 hours.

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sabbysteg.livejournal.com

Yeah. Well, I don't like the law myself, but I never have given birth and don't intend to so thanks for providing perspective.

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tigerfemme.livejournal.com

This seems...just strange, and somewhat frightening in concept. Some women prefer to be under the care of a midwife with a doctor on-call. And I truly believe that women have the right to not use medical assistance. Maybe that's radical of me but I think that the (male-centric) medical profession has intruded a *lot* on a woman's right in coordinating her own care...including medicalizing the very natural process of birth.

I think for some women there is no *doubt* that they need medical care on-hand during birth, including being at a hospital or birthing center.

And...12 hours? You *really* think mother or father or partner or family member's collective minds are going to be on calling and reporting the child's birth? This is like having to call an HMO before going to the emergency room (i.e. if someone is sick enough to go to the ER, is the focus going to be on calling the insurance first?).

The whole bill seems ill-advised and unnecessary. Does anyone know, or could anyone find out, what the *point* of this is? What do they hope to achieve?

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Some women prefer to be under the care of a midwife with a doctor on-call. And I truly believe that women have the right to not use medical assistance. Maybe that's radical of me but I think that the (male-centric) medical profession has intruded a *lot* on a woman's right in coordinating her own care...including medicalizing the very natural process of birth.

Bingo.

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Do you live in Virgina?

Are you planning to write anyone in response to this?

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No, I live in Massachusetts. I have chosen to have my baby (in five short weeks, woo hoo!) at a hospital, with a midwife and doula in attendance. But I believe we all have the right to make the choice to deliver our babies how and where we choose, and I'm realyl bothered by seeing legislation like this. I didn't even realize that there were so many states where midwifery/homebirth was a potentially illegal act!

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Having the child at home isn't illegal, not reporting it is illegal... I'm not sure why this would be a problem, though I see that you would probably want more time to rest and stuff.

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haggis.livejournal.com

Making something illegal is difficult.

Making something so difficult that it is almost impossible to do it legally is much easier and achieves the same objective.

eg Section 21 in Britain which didn't make it illegal to talk to kids about homosexuality, just very difficult.

I have to agree, the aim of this law seems to be to make home births difficult and hence put people off.

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That's because the Authorities presume that it's safer to give birth in a hospital ful of expensive equipment and doctors. Which it is. But a lot of ppl don't want that, which they don't understand.

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dropdowntowncat.livejournal.com

it might also have something to do with doctors feeling that midwives are an 'economic threat.'

i mean, that's one of the reasons why midwifery was made illegal in the mid 1800s [in canada, anyway..i'm not sure about the US], a few hundred years BEFORE hospitalized births were the 'norm'...that, and the fact that midwives would perform abortions.

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That's because the Authorities presume that it's safer to give birth in a hospital ful of expensive equipment and doctors. Which it is.

What did you base that, which was worded as though its a statement of fact, and not just your personal opinion, on?

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Because if things went horribly wrong there is more chance that it could be fixed if you were in a hopsital where they would be abell to operate than in your house, which whilst nice and comfortable and possibly an emotionally 'better' place to have kids probably doesn't have an operating theatre.

Of course there are benefits to home births, just the 'modern advances' in medicine are pretty useless to you if you are in your house where most if not all modern techniques probably can't be performed.

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How often do you think births go wrong?

And what kind of horribly wrong thing? Most home births are seen after by a doula/widwife, and they're experiences or trained enough to know if things aren't progressing naturally, and would then take you to the hospital. If that were the case, which it rarely is.

Millions of births happen in places other than the white-westren-male-centric concept of a hospital, without incidence. I think a huge problem is that those kind of socities have forgotten that birth really is an incredibly natural process. It's been happening for billions of years before 'modern advances' well enough that we're here today.

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Yes, most births go right. But 100 years ago one of the major causes of death was childbirth.

Yes, there are plenty of reasons for thinking that home is best, and it quite possibly is. But if the authorities are going to be made responsible for you and you're childs health they really don't want to discover that bad things happened because you coulnd't be treated in the apropriate manner.

How do you mean what kind of horribly wrong thing? There are instances where a caesarion will be required. There are instances where the baby isn't breathing and needs attention. I'm sure you (having had a child) are aware of the myriad dangers inherint in childbirth... or course in most cases it's safe, but in some cases it isn't.

And some authorities would rather that you had kids in hospital because they decided for you that it's the safest thing... which is bad, because obviously that choice is yours.

*wibble*

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racing-turtle.livejournal.com

Hospital birth is not safer than home birth!

If you do a search on medline and read through the literature home birth is as safe as or in many cases safer than hospital birth if you are healthy and your pregnancy is progressing normally.

Midwives (Certified Professional, liscensed and nurse) (like doctors) have the skills to identify complications, to transfer mothers at the least signs of these complications so that the mothers can avail themselves of the hospital resources.

The unique skill midwives have is to also recognize the natural variations in childbirth and labor and to know that birth does not always belong in a hospital.

I can talk for hours on the subject so I will leave it at this.

Molly

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Ah yes, if everything *works* them home birth is fine and wonderful. If you need an emergency Caesarion then there's f*** all that can be done at home, in a hospital they presumably have surgeons and aneasthatists in the room, or at least the building.

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moominmuppet.livejournal.com

Homebirth and Hospital birth have _different_ potential complications - one isn't overwhelmingly safer than the other, it's just different sets of risks. There are a number of iatrogenic problems that are common in hospital births that don't occur in homebirths, for example.

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I certainly don't agree with it, but if I were to rationalise and think of why, my best guess would be to prevent people from having child and dumping them off. Remember a few years back there was a string of incidences in the news about teen mothers who had their babies in bathrooms or alleis and left the baby in there, or in the dumpster or something like that?

(I think that those incidences were far over sensationalised though, and generally society's condemnation of teen mothers, which is really rather sad and pathetic at best, and usually disguisting.)

So, though I don't agree, that would have to be my best guess whilst staying in the realms of sanity. Which, you know, isn't always the case with government officials.

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Yes, I, too believe that's most likely the intent of this bill - it just seems so broadly written and vague as to pose a real problem with the issue of those who choose homebirth in that state.

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crackmonkey.livejournal.com

Another possibility (and the one I've oft heard cited) is to prevent people from falsifying identification. It's rather silly, but the reasoning goes that if you had your baby in a hospital, you'd have to have a helluva lot of collusion to NOT have the baby "registered".

"Registration", as it stands now, includes getting an SSN *at birth*. It also means registration of birth certificates in any new "central registry" they should decide to enact. I need to dig up some links to back all this up, because it's vague in my head.

Basically, it would seem to be control of identification registration and nationalization/naturalization purposes. Which is silly, given you can still get around this easily enough by having a homebirth and bribing a doctor or somesuch, but hey, the govt is full of half-assed efforts.

FYI, I didn't get my SSN till I got a job, I missed the federal law requiring SSN registration at birth by a few years.

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cymru.livejournal.com

That is frightening. I wonder what its chances are of passing?

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