Think it Over...
"The international standing of the U.S. [in terms of infant mortality rates] did not really begin to fall until the mid-1950s. This correlates perfectly with the founding of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologist (ACOG) in 1951. ACOG is a trade union representing the financial and professional interests of obstetricians who has sought to secure a monopoly in pregnancy and childbirth services. Prior to ACOG, the U.S. always ranked in 10th place or better. Since the mid-1950s the U.S. has consistently ranked below 12th place and hasn't been above 16th place since 1975. The relative standing of the U.S. continues to decline even to the present." (Stewart, David, International Infant Mortality Rates--U.S. in 22nd Place, NAPSAC News, Fall-Winter, 1993, p.38)
" ...Since home birth and direct entry midwifery are perfectly safe options, (a majority of) State legislatures have concluded that it is the right of each woman and her family to choose such options. State laws must guarantee families the freedom to choose home birth by recognizing the type of midwifery which focuses principally on out-of-hospital birth, direct entry midwifery."
"State legislatures are also concerned with guaranteeing an open marketplace and fair competition, including in health care services. To exclude direct entry midwives from practice is to allow a scientifically unjustified monopoly of doctors and nurse midwives... "
-Marsden Wagner, to the Va.JCHC, 1998
"Every study that has compared midwives and obstetricians has found better outcomes for midwives for same-risk patients. In some studies, midwives actually served higher risk populations than the physicians and still obtained lower mortalities and morbidities. The superiority and safety of midwifery for most women no longer needs to be proven. It has been well established." (Madrona, Lewis & Morgaine, The Future of Midwifery in the United States, NAPSAC News, Fall-Winter, 1993, p.30)
Records kept from 1969-73 in England and Wales indicate still birth rates of 4.5 per 1000 births for home deliveries as opposed to 14.8 per 1000 births for hospital deliveries. (The Place of Birth, Sheila Kitzinger & John Davis, eds., 1978 Oxford University Press, pp. 62-63)
"Dr. DeLee, who introduced forceps and episiotomy
around the turn of the century, stated just before he died that if he had his whole life to live over he would do home births and nothing else, realizing that the majority of his work was probably going to do bad instead of good."
-Mayer Eisenstein, MD in Safe Alternatives in Childbirth
In The five European countries with the lowest infant mortality rates, midwives preside at more than 70 percent of all births. More than half of all Dutch babies are born at home with midwives in attendance, and Holland's maternal and infant mortality rates are far lower than in the United States..." ("Midwives Still Hassled by Medical Establishment," Caroline Hall Otis, Utne Reader, Nov./Dec. 1990, pp. 32-34)
"Mothering Magazine has calculated that using midwifery care for 75% of the births in the U.S. would save an estimated $8.5 billion per year." (Madrona, Lewis & Morgaine, The Future of Midwifery in the United States, NAPSAC News, Fall-Winter, 1993, p. 15)
The safety of home birth: the farm study
American Journal of Public Health. 82(3):450-3, 1992 Mar.
Pregnancy outcomes of 1707 women, who enrolled for care between 1971 and 1989 with a home birth service run by lay midwives in rural Tennessee, were compared with outcomes from 14,033 physician-attended hospital deliveries derived from the 1980 US National Natality/National Fetal Mortality Survey. Based on rates of perinatal death, of low 5-minute Apgar scores, of a composite index of labor complications, and of use of assisted delivery, the results suggest that, under certain circumstances, home births attended by lay midwives can be accomplished as safely as, and with less intervention than, physician-attended hospital deliveries.
"Only about 15% of medical interventions are supported by solid scientific evidence...This is partly because only 1% of the studies in medical journals are scientifically sound and partly because many treatments have not been assessed at all."
Richard Smith
editor of the British Medical Journal
"Unless we put medical freedom into the Constitution, the time will come when medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship to restrict the art of healing to one class of men and deny equal privileges to others. The Constitution of this Republic should make a special privilege for medical freedom as well as religious freedom."
- Benjamin Rush
Physician and Signer of the Declaration of Independence
Return to American College of Traditional Midwives Resources ~ Inspiration & Empowerment
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