This column came out of an online conversation I had with an obstetrician. It is a lie of enormous proportions that homebirth attended by midwives is dangerous, negligent, and a killer of women and babies. This was first illuminated in a major study of maternal mortality conducted in Aberdeen, Scotland, in 1929. It was found that mothers having homebirths with midwives in attendance experienced a death rate of 2.8 per 1000, while women attended at home by physicians had a rate of 6.9 per 1000. A Study of all Puerperal Deaths, 1930-1932.
Women of today are foolish to think their survival rates are exemplary.
Because the data give only the leading cause of death and not underlying causes, it is quite possible that the leading cause of death, namely hemorrhage is, in many cases, hemorrhage associated with cesarean section. Although individual states have regulations that require such deaths to be reported, no one, including you or me or scientists wanting to study why these women die, can get access to information on these maternal deaths. A must-have for anyone interested in midwifery and the origins of medicalized birth. Vital statistics of the United States. WHO's Maternal Mortality Rates .