Don't stymie choice of home childbirth

One wonders what process the American Medical Association House of Delegates used to determine that its resolution on home deliveries was prudent and reasonable. AMA resolution 205 attempts to outlaw a woman’s choice to give birth at home or in a freestanding birth center by calling for legislation to establish hospitals and hospital-based birth centers as the safest place for labor, delivery and postpartum recovery. Further, it seeks to establish that hospital-based midwives who work under the control of physicians are the only safe midwifery practitioners. The Midwives Alliance of North America, which has represented midwives since 1982 and whose members are specialists in homebirth, finds the resolution arrogant, patronizing and self-serving. We have three major objections. First, the resolution patently ignores the vast... [read full story]