The Skeptical OB

I’ve been writing about the issue of US maternal mortality for years, and for years I’ve argued that most of the supposed increase is a result of improved reporting of maternal deaths, not more deaths. That view was confirmed by the recent paper Is the United States Maternal Mortality Rate Increasing? Disentangling trends from measurement […]

There is something morally grotesque about watching Republican legislators — all of whom get free Obamacare Plus on the public dime — compete with each other over designing the most unjust healthcare insurance system for others who may rely on the public dime. I have a simple suggestion. Let’s mandate that Republican legislators get only […]

The impact of baby Landon’s death from insufficient breastmilk continues to reverberate around the world and lactation consultants continue to whine that such deaths are not their fault. The brutal truth is that lactivists lie and babies die. A new paper from the UK provides more tragic examples. [pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Both […]

Mr. Jones, so nice to meet you. Allow me to introduce myself, Ima Frawde, IBCEC. What are the letters for? International Board Certified Ejaculation Consultant, of course. I support men who have ejaculation dysfunction at the low introductory price of $200 per hour. I’m here to help you with your erectile dysfunction. Examine you? No, […]

I just read a fantastic piece in The New Statesman. John Elledge writes about politicians’ preferred fall back strategy when their programs don’t work: blame the voters for not believing enough. “The moment you doubt whether you can fly,” J M Barrie once wrote, “You cease for ever to be able to do it.” Elsewhere […]

What if I told you that hundreds of babies die each year in industrialized countries from a problem that could be easily prevented by better patient and provider education? You’d jump at the chance to fix the problem, wouldn’t you? [pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]In industrialized countries, aggressive breastfeeding promotion kills far more […]

Lactivists are in a frenzy over the success of the Fed Is Best Foundation. How dare anyone suggest that breastfeeding — unlike every other aspect of reproduction — is not always perfect? How dare anyone point out that the relentless focus on exclusive breastfeeding is harming babies and harming mothers? And how dare anyone deprive […]

The discovery of a biomarker for low breastmilk supply demonstrates that low supply is real, is common and that mothers who complain of low supply are not mistaken. Perhaps that will stop lactivists from lying about the incidence low supply and gaslighting women who have concerns about supply and fear that their infants are starving. […]

The Fed Is Best Foundation recently published the tragic story of a baby who died because of the lactivist lie that insufficient breastmilk is rare. Bereaved mother Jillian Johnson generously shared the story of her son Landon in order to prevent anyone suffering the heartbreak that she has suffered. [pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” […]

Homebirth advocates in the US, the UK, Canada and elsewhere have long considered the Netherlands to be a paradise of homebirth midwifery. They haven’t been paying attention; Dutch perinatal death rates were found to be among the highest in Western Europe and Dutch mothers have been abandoning homebirth in droves. When I started Homebirth Debate, […]