There has been a lot of discussion on midwifery and childbirth email lists in the past few weeks in reaction to a statement by ACOG that birth should take place in hospital. I can’t understand, for the life of me, why ACOG’s opinion on homebirth would interest anyone remotely associated with childbirth.
Aren’t these the illustrious folks who gave us 50 years of universal episiotomies? Aren’t they the people who prescribed thalidomide, high dose birth control pills, and hormone replacement for vast numbers of menopausal women? Aren’t they the ones who have made a fortune from amputating the foreskins of millions of helpless baby boys? Haven’t they unnecessarily induced labour and cut the bellies of millions of trusting women? Need I go on? Really, why would any right thinking woman be dissuaded from homebirth by the opinion of ACOG?
Although I didn’t even bother to read their statement on homebirth because I could care less, I DID want to see what they had to say last week about collecting cord blood for freezing. Now, THAT was interesting. They did not go the way of the British Society which clearly tells their members that freezing cord blood is a scam that should be done away with by intelligent people. http://thecordblood.net/?p=25 No, the American group (some call them the S. O. B.’s) tells their members that they should be informing their patients about the back door payments they receive for soliciting for the cord blood monsters. If you look closely at their statement, the message is there that cord blood banking is a ridiculous waste of money for no earthly good whatsoever but the door is left wide open for the obstetricians to continue padding their bank accounts from the stupidity of the public.
http://www.acog.org/from_home
ACOG has lost credibility with the women of N. America. When midwives, nurses and doulas realize that fact, they will stop caring what ACOG has to say. It would be of more interest to me what the Teamster’s Union thinks about homebirth.
Gloria Lemay, Vancouver, BC
