Don't get me wrong.  I am a great proponant of participatory childbirth,
having had all three of my babies with no meds or interventions, and two of
them at home.  However, I was very lucky to have had uncomplicated
prgnancies and labors and skillful midwives. We must never forget that birth
can be fatal, and in past eras, the average life span of women was very low
(in the 40's I believe) because the number of women who died in childbirth
was so very high.  These women were all having "natural" childbirth, and it
killed a lot of them.

 The infant mortality rate would likewise be as high as it used to be were
it not for interventions of various sorts.  As someone else mentioned, these
life-saving techniques have added much uncertainty to the mix, as women and
children who wouldn't otherwise have survived now do.

 What I think we want to do is try to provide the kind of really safe
birthing environments that Michel Odent speaks about so eloquently.  And we
want to provide education about the risks of interventions as well as their
benefits.  We want our OBs and midwives to read the literature about early
inductions, over-use of c-section and potential affects of meds on infants
and mothers.  Then, if interventions are needed, we would have them
available, but use them at a much reduced rate and never for convenience.
We would have birth attendents who are skilled enough at feeding assessment
to catch the compromised infants and provide assistance until everyone
recovers enough not to need extra help.

Barbara Wilson-Clay, BS, IBCLC
Austin Lactation Associates
LactNews Press
www.lactnews.com
PLEASE NOTE NEW EMAIL ADDRESS:  [log in to unmask]

             ***********************************************

To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail
To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest)
To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet
All commands go to [log in to unmask]

The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html