Caesarean = rape?

Image credit: www.caesarean-art.com

As we all know, the caesarean rate (emergency and elective) has risen dramatically over the past decade in most of the industrialised world and 'natural' childbirth has become something of a vestigial organ.

For many women, a caesarean is not only painful but also traumatic. Somehow birth has become only about a healthy outcome and not necessarily about the process or the woman actually giving birth. There is now a growing subculture of women who compare their caesarean births to rape given the lack of control they felt they had over their bodies, the antagonism of hospital staff towards their birth choices and of course, feelings of violation. Recent articles about birth rape are linked to the story of an Arizona mother, Jessica Szabo, who wants to have a VBAC (vaginal birth after caesarean) but is being refused by her local hospital. The hospital argues that all VBACs must have an 'elective caesarean'. In fact, she's so mad that she has written the following message on her minivan:

"Page Hospital enter my body without my permission ... sounds like rape to me!"

There is even an anonymous website devoted to caesarean-inspired art evoking the trauma and pain some women associate with the procedure. Truly haunting (see above).

What do you think?

Caesareans rising to alarming rates in US

Bad news: The caesarean rate has risen for the 11th year in a row in the US. With the caesar rate hovering at nearly 32% of births, Pam Udy, president of the International Caesarean Awareness Network advocacy group, has said, "Every pregnant woman in the US should be alarmed by this rate".

Bad news: The teen birth rate has risen for the second straight year thanks to crucial cuts in sex education funding in American schools. Basically, this is a case of too much sex and not enough contraception.

The most recent statistics have revealed that the US birth rate skyrocketed in 2007 to 4.3 million babies and nearly 40% of those births were out-of-wedlock and to mostly Hispanic and African-American women.

Good news: Premature and low-birth weight babies are decreasing after a long upward trend.

Source: Caesareans soar in the new US baby boom

Elective caesars on the way out in the UK

It is no secret that caesarean rates are rising rapidly in the western world (currently 23% in Britain). In a bold move, the NHS (UK) has barred women from routinely having elective caesars because they are too expensive and strain the national health care budget. In Greater Manchester, elective caesars are being limited to women that can demonstrate specific health problems.

Some obstetricians, however, are firmly against the move. Dr Christoph Lees, an obstetrician and gynaecologist at Addenbrooke’s hospital in Cambridge, said: “I strongly disagree with this prescriptive condition setting. Sometimes well-informed women, often older and very unlikely to have further children, do request caesarean sections and it is unreasonable to refuse if they are fully informed.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. Although the rates of caesareans are ridiculously out of control at present, is it productive to limit women's choices even further? Sure, I would never choose to have a caesarean unless medically necessary but what's right for me isn't necessarily the right choice for everyone else.

What do we think? Is this something that should be implemented in the US, Canada and Australia?

Source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/health/article5734096.ece

Don't have a caesar before 39 weeks!

Just the way I like to start my morning...finding a reason to hate Victoria Beckham just a little bit more...

Turns out a new study has shown that scheduling a caesar earlier for reasons of convenience is bad for baby and for mum. In a group of 24,000 babies, those who were born at 37 weeks to mothers who had elective caesars were twice as likely to experience breathing problems and blood infections. Even though babies are considered 'full term' at this stage, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists suggests that women wait until at least 39 weeks. It is also argued that breastfeeding and bonding can be more difficult the earlier a baby is born.

On the other side of the coin, Michael F. Greene of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, who wrote an editorial accompanying the study said, "This paper, although it provides important information about risk, does not give us the whole story. It doesn't provide an accounting of how many babies may have died waiting to get to 39 weeks. You have to balance both sides of the ledger."

There you have it. Don't be like Posh and have your baby earlier if you don't need to.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/7eqee5

Caesarean boom in New York

Scary.

New York City's cesarean section rate has increased by 24% over the past six years to an average of nearly 31%, and rates are on the rise at nearly every single city hospital, according to new data released by Choices in Childbirth.

Contrary to popular belief, caesar rates are not going up because of more 'elective' caesars or because more 'older' women are getting pregnant and are at greater 'risk' of complication. For instance, only 1 in 1600 caesars are 'elective. According to this new data, caesars are increasing from women across every age, race, and socio-economic status.

The most likely explanation seems to be that American birth is just getting more medicalised: women are less informed about alternative birth options and interventions are increasing due to fears of medical malpractice.

As a result Choices in Childbirth, a non-profit maternity education group in New York is urging NYC to create an online database providing info on all New York hospitals so women know their options when they are choosing a place and a method for birth.

Source: www.choicesinchildbirth.org
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/118284.php

Caesars high in Canada

Turns out the caesar rate is not just high here in Australia where almost one-third of mothers have their children via caesarean section. Caesarean rates have risen in Oz from 18 per cent in 1991, to 30 per cent in 2005.

Canadian women are jumping on the caesar train as rates of obesity and 'older' motherhood are increasing. According to new reports, 1 in 4 Canadian women are having caesars. From 1993 to2006, Canada's caesarean rate increased from 17.6 percent to 26.3 percent. For Canada - one of the safest places in the world to givebirth - this rising rate is alarming. According to The Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada, more caesars puts more pressure on a maternity system that is already over-stretched.

We are seeing the future and it is not good.

Source: www.sogc.org

Insurance companies are evil

Again, sorry. I'm not normally this slack with my blogging. I do feel like I'm heavily pregnant with this damn thesis. I'm about 7 weeks from my due date and it's getting pretty hard to do anything these days without thinking about the birth. My head, hands and feet are swollen with visions of edited chapters, all of the typos still to correct and the insane amount of formatting still left to do.

Anyway, I've been wanting to write about this for awhile but couldn't find the time until now.

Apparently, the push (to not push) for caesarean births has finally come to a head. As impatient obstetricians continue to corral pregnant women into operating theatres, it seems that some American insurance companies are actually refusing to cover women with a history of caesarean births. As we all know, insurance companies will not come near anyone with anything remotely recognisable as a 'preexisting condition', it seems that given the impressive list of health risks associated with caesareans, insurance companies are keeping their hands off.

Women who had had caesars are being charged higher premiums or being denied insurance altogther. This covers both elective and emergency caesars. Given that the caesar rate is at an all time high--31% (eek!)---it is women who are suffering now. That doctors overuse the surgery and often do not allow women who have had previous caesareans to deliver vaginally (VBAC), women are now being labelled as undesirable insurance candidates by no fault of their own.

Some insurance companies have not excluded the procedure from coverage completely: One insurance company, Golden Rule, said they would pay for a caesar only if they would not have to cover another one for at least three years. Similarly, Blue Cross Blue Shield said they would cover caesars but only at the cost of a 25% increase in premiums for the next 5 years.

Nevertheless, in being denied medical insurance women and their babies are being placed at enormous danger. After all, it is only recently that the rates of maternal and infant mortality have increased since 2005 and the US has the second worst rate for newborn deaths of industrialised nations.

Does anyone have any experience with this? Have you been denied insurance?

Sources: http://www.msmagazine.com/news/uswirestory.asp?ID=11061

Christina A opens up about being opened up

In the latest edition of Hello! Christina Aguilera talks about having an elective caesar because she was too scared to give birth vaginally. She says:

"I'd heard horror stories about tearing. I really wanted a calm and peaceful environment. I didn't want any surprises."

Uh huh. Calm and peaceful is pretty easy when you can't feel the lower half of your body and there is a big screen shielding you from the view of your own body splayed open. Sure, squeezing a big baby from a tiny opening and tearing is no walk in the park, but one wonders why the thought of having one's abdominal muscles cut in half isn't viewed as a far more horrifying prospect?

Source: http://www.hellomagazine.com/music/2008/02/15/aguilera-baby/

Image: Caesarean, 1666 http://www.washington.edu/alumni/columns/sept00/delivery4.html

J.Lo too good for paper hospital gown

It seems the more time I devote to following celebrity pregnancy, which at one time used to give me an unsettling thrill, now is just starting to make me angry. Celebrity preggos no longer appeal to me as 'real' women with the luxury of a bit of fame and fortune, but rather caricatures of 'isms': flagrant consumerism, narcissism and old school maternalism. Or maybe it's just because I have serious issues with J.Lo.

What has prompted my rant? Well, according to MSNBC J.Lo has not only had couture hospital gowns prepared for her hospital stay but has apparently elected to have a caesar for the birth of her alleged twins. I don't know what makes me more angry, the fact that J.Lo is too good for a paper hospital gown and requires a matching couture robe or that she's having an elective caesar. Why in the world would you choose to have a caesar unless it was medically necessary? Given that all of these celebrity women apparently want to have babies so badly, I find it really hard to believe that they are all so 'busy' that they simply do not have time to allow a baby (or babies, whatever the case may be) to come into the world in its own time. A caesarean does not make birth easier contrary to popular belief. It's amazing that such smart, successful women continue to believe their bodies are not capable of pushing out a baby.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22940662/