Gárdaí 'relevant stakeholders' in home birth

Treeplanter

"Birth lobby and midwifery groups have denounced draft HSE guidelines suggesting that Gárdaí might be brought to the scene of a home birth should a mother exercise her right to make an informed decision that conflicts with HSE terms.
Taken together, these guidelines and sections form an architecture of coercion. Mothers who fall outside the draconian and prejudicial terms laid down for the State home birth service may be forcibly hospitalised, while midwives who, like other professionals, seek to exercise their autonomy may face a jail sentence of up to 10 years"

Is this not totally insane??!!! We need to stand up for ourselves here!

Nevyn

Do you have a link for this?

Cat Melodeon

From the AIMS website:

http://www.aimsireland.com/news/?topic=newsBulletin#_nbItem9

PRESS RELEASE
November 15, 2010
Gárdaí ‘relevant stakeholders’ in home birth—HSE
Birth lobby and midwifery groups have denounced draft HSE guidelines suggesting that Gárdaí might be brought to the scene of a home birth should a mother exercise her right to make an informed decision that conflicts with HSE terms. ‘These draft guidelines interlock ominously with sections of the Nurses and Midwives Bill currently going through the Dáil’, said Marie O’Connor of the National Birth Alliance.
‘Taken together, these guidelines and sections form an architecture of coercion. Mothers who fall outside the draconian and prejudicial terms laid down for the State home birth service may be forcibly hospitalised, while midwives who, like other professionals, seek to exercise their autonomy may face a jail sentence of up to 10 years’. Draft HSE guidelines recently circulated go so far as to define the Gárda Siochána as ‘relevant stakeholders’ in home birth.
‘Section 40 of the Bill, in effect, undermines women’s rights by withdrawing access to midwifery care in childbirth at a time when that care may be critical. Women have a right to appropriate health care, to bodily integrity and self- determination. They also have right to decline medical intervention. The Bill effectively denies women the freedom to give birth as they wish’, said Dr Krysia Lynch of the Home Birth Association.
The groups are looking for amendments to Sections 24 and 40 of the Bill. They say the legislation, as drafted, will be ‘catastrophic’ in its effects. Self-employed midwife Philomena Canning says: ‘the Bill, as it stands, threatens the future of midwifery, criminalises autonomous midwifery practice, conflicts with a midwife’s duty of care and denies midwives the right to run their own profession, a right enjoyed by all other health professionals in law. HSE are using the State indemnity scheme as a vehicle to control the practice of self-employed midwives. The Bill effectively strips them of their right to private practice.’
Jene Kelly of the Association for Improvements in the Maternity Services (Ireland) says the Bill is ‘unfair, unjust and discriminatory’. ‘ It treats midwives differently from medical practitioners and treats self-employed midwives differently from hospital midwives. Mothers and babies will be the losers. The Bill effectively removes women’s freedom to opt out of the active management machine. Choice in childbirth for women requires all midwives to be treated equally before the law.’
Philomena Canning said the Bill, unless amended, would render the practice of self-employed midwives in the community ‘nightmarish’. ‘The Bill places the midwife in an intolerable dilemma: whether to assist the mother under circumstances where she is no longer indemnified––and possibly be jailed for doing so under Section 40 ––or else stand idly by. Withdrawing care from a mother who suddenly ceases to conform to insurance criteria in mid-labour is an appalling vista.’
Other groups supporting the amendments to Sections 24 and 40 include the INMO (Midwives' Section), the Community Midwives’ Association, the Trinity College Birth Project Group, the Doulas’ Association of Ireland and Clare Birth Choice.
Inquiries:
Krysia Lynch Home Birth Association of Ireland 087 7543751
Jene Kelly, Association for Improvements in the Maternity Services (Ireland) 087 6819095
Philomena Canning, self-employed midwife 087 2900017
Marie O'Connor, National Birth Alliance 086 8180254

can't find anything on the HSE site itself.