In a message dated 1/2/99 12:00:19 PM Eastern Standard Time, [log in to unmask] writes: << Well, go visit an "old" cemetery and count the infant graves and then go to a "new" cemetery and count the infant graves. Need I say more? Perhaps we should go back to the prehistoric "good ole days" when more than 50% of infants did not make it to one year of age. To paraphrase a famous quote: Those who do not know their history are doomed to repeat it. Your study of one out of 12 is hardly proof of anything. >> Andrew: It's certainly true that modern medicine saves *sick* babies' lives. As the mother of a 12 month old (birthday tomorrow!) who was born last January with persistent fetal circulation and who spent several lifesaving weeks in the NICU (where, by the way, he never had a single bottle until the day I put him to breast with nasal cannula still in at ten days of age), I am acutely aware of how different things are for babies with health problems in 1999 as opposed to 1889. And since you are on a l*st full of other medical professionals, you can be quite sure that everyone else is too. However, to doubt that the *routine* (meaning, not medically necessary) interventions of our technological birthing culture are iatrogenic is to ignore the research. Check out my article on this topic at: http://www.goodnewsnet.org/weekly/minnesto.htm Katie-- working at her computer today with her chronically aching, epidural- injured back aching terribly Katie Allison Granju Knoxville, TN