Congratulations to the blogger at Hiking the Paper Trail to Parenthood. You win the prize for packing the highest volume of stupid claims into any post of its size!
The blogger, an expectant mother, is so ignorant about childbirth that she is happily transmitting mistruths, half truths and outright lies in her post 8 Things Not To Say to a Crunchy Expectant Mother : A Tirade.
Consider these whoppers:
1. “Women die in hospitals in the US during and after birth.”
Duh. That’s because childbirth is dangerous.
The issue is not whether women die in the hospital during and after childbirth, the issue is the RATE of death compared to the rate of death at homebirth.
2. A completely fabricated, bald faced lie: “The United States of America currently (as of Summer of 2012) has the highest mother and infant mortality rate of every developed country in the world.”
No, not even close. Not to mention that infant mortality is the wrong statistic and that international comparisons of mortality rates are invalid since many countries cheat by counting LIVE premature babies as stillbirths.
3. “Holland, the has some of the best infant and maternal mortality rates in the developed world, with a common 80% of births taking place at home.”
I guess if you are going to make stuff up, you might as well go all the way. The Netherlands has one of the worst perinatal mortality rates in Western Europe and a homebirth rate of 27% and falling. Dutch midwives caring for low risk women (home or hospital) have death rates HIGHER than Dutch obstetricians caring for high risk patients.
4. “My midwives’ rate of patients who end up in Cesarean is less than 4%.”
And what are the death rates of homebirth midwives? Let me guess: the blogger has no clue that LICENSED homebirth midwives attending PLANNED homebirths have death rates up to 800% higher than term hospital birth. Let me guess; the blogger has no clue that the Midwives Alliance of North America (MANA), the organization that represents homebirth midwives refuses to release the death rates of their members because those rates are so hideous.
5. “I have never heard of someone getting a “super germ” like mrsa (a potentially lethal and antibiotic-resistant infection) in their own home.”
Most cases of MRSA (methicillin resistant staph aureus) are “community acquired” not hospital acquired.
6. “Both midwives have the same neonatal resuscitation experience as L&D and NICU staff in a hospital.”
Possibly the stupidest of the many stupid claims in this piece. Most homebirth midwives have NO training in advanced resuscitation, have NO experience in advanced resuscitation, and have NEVER intubated a baby.
7. “There will be medications, IVs and oxygen available if they are needed.”
Will there be an operating room? If not, and you experience a life threatening emergency, your baby will die. Will there be someone skilled in intubation and advanced neonatal resuscitation? If not, and your baby is born needing more than a little oxygen, your baby may die or suffer permanent brain injury. Will there be blood for transfusions? If not, you can hemorrhage to death long before you get to the nearest hospital.
8. “The people who ask this question are the ones to whom information and education have no impact.”
No, honey, you are the one on whom information and education have had no impact because you are the one who hasn’t been exposed to either information or education. Reading the lies of other homebirth advocates on the internet and gullibly believing them is not “education,” it is merely a sign of lack of basic knowledge of science, statistics and childbirth.
Here’s some real information you can use:
Planned homebirth with an American homebirth midwife is the MOST dangerous form of planned birth in the US.
Take down your post, which is utter crap, stop spewing arrant nonsense, and learn some actual facts about childbirth. I guarantee you will be very, very surprised.
