Home birth with a midwife is not a crime

…well, in most states, anyway. Via Jennifer Block (author of Pushed), I see that Missouri — where certified midwives can be charged as felons for simply doing their jobs — is debating legislation that would legalize midwife-assisted birth.

Even as midwifery grows increasingly popular nationwide, with an estimated 40,000 babies born outside hospitals last year, a handful of states remain severely restrictive of the profession. In nine states, including Illinois, Iowa and Indiana, some forms of midwifery are illegal, though not a felony. Missouri, the only state where midwives can be charged as felons, has long been the most hostile to the practice of midwifery, though hundreds of families like the Kerrs rely on an underground network of midwives who quietly operate outside the law.
Now Missouri finds itself in the national spotlight on the issue. A state lawmaker, whose wife was aided in a pregnancy by a midwife, pushed through legislation this year that would allow midwives to practice freely in the state, and Gov. Matt Blunt signed the bill into law. But opponents quickly filed a lawsuit to overturn it, state courts ordered an injunction, and the law cannot go into effect until the Missouri Supreme Court rules on its legality, probably early next year.

If even uber-conservative Gov. Matt Blunt is in favor of decriminalizing midwife births, then who, you might ask, is against the legislation? The answer, though the article manages to completely gloss over it, is advocacy groups like the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the Missouri State Medical Association, which represent the interests of doctors. Not pregnant women and their families.
For more on related issues, see Sarah Blustain’s review of Pushed and Born in the USA for the Women’s Review of Books.