Reply to Evelyn Muhlhan - another homebirth midwife bites the dust?

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Reply to "Evelyn Muhlhan - another homebirth midwife bites the dust?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]12:26, you don't seem irrational, I didn't mean to suggest that. But can I ask, what rights do you think a full term baby has, if any, and who has the power to enforce those rights, if anyone, other than the mother?[/quote]

It's an interesting and valuable question, which I have definitely spent some time pondering but have difficulty coming to an absolute answer on.  I do believe that unborn babies have the right to life, but unfortunately we have a problem in that doctors cannot guarantee a perfect outcome.  I[b]n fact, they have similar outcomes in terms of maternal/infant morbidity and mortality as homebirth midwives do - there is not a huge difference; for some things homebirth is better, and in other things the hospital is best - but overall the stats are similar, and for the foreseeable future will always include a small number of bad outcomes.[/b]  So while we might say that full-term babies have a "right to life", there isn't any way to absolutely protect that right.

So, given that, the reasonable thing is that as long as a mother is healthy (meaning, not drugged out or mentally incompetent), and her intent is to have a healthy baby, I believe we have to entrust her to make the best decisions possible for herself and her unborn baby.   Given these circumstances, I think it would be a horrendous invasion of personal privacy for the government - or worse, a doctor - to step in and force a woman to birth in a particular way.  Except in extremely rare cases, no one cares more about her baby than the mother who is about to give birth to it.[/quote]

No, this is not true. [b]For high risk births,[/b] the mortality rate for babies and mothers is much high with home births than with hospital births. Please do not confuse a woman's right to determine her medical care with medical science.[/quote]

Like what, specifically?

No matter what, [b]medical science still should not have the final say in what I do with my (and therefore, my unborn baby's) body[/b].[/quote]

No one is saying that a rational, competent adult should not have the autonomy to make medical decisions. HOWEVER, part of making an informed decision means understanding that there are very real risks associated with giving birth, and that some of these risks (uterine rupture, pre-eclampsia, extreme prematurity (32W-), etc.) that require hospital facilities and personnel. 
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