HW 39 - Insights from Book - Part 2

List several topics/areas the book has taught you about that the "Business of Being Born" either ignored or treated differently or in less depth.

Midwives have been harassed over the years by obstetricians because of competition:

"The more the practice of midwifery grows and succeeds, the more threatening midwives are to the obstetric monopoly, so, predictably, there has been an obstetric backlash"

-Wagner, Marsden, Born In The USA, Los Angeles, CA

Obstetricians are sued constantly:

"Obstetricians are sued more than physicians in any other speciality, In the United States, a member of ACOG can expect to be sued 2.53 times over the course of his career.."

-Wagner, Marsden, Born In The USA, Los Angeles, CA

If lawyers of doctors are doubting the success of their case they will file orders that make it hard for the issue to be talked about outside of court making it hard for scientists and others to prove the use of Cytotec

"When they don't think they can win a case, lawyers for doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies settle cases out of court and include a gag order on families and their lawyers in the settlement that makes it a crime for them to discuss the case publicly. For this reason, it is very difficult for scientists, policy makers, and health care consumers to discover the extent of the litigation involving Cytotec induction.

-Wagner, Marsden, Born In The USA, Los Angeles, CA

The major insight the book tries to communicate in the second 100 pages

Because of the tribal obstetrics that have taken place in hospitals in (mainly) America in the last century, the rate of failed pregnancies and later complications in the woman's body have increased and should be stopped.

Your response to that insight
Through all the evidence given by Wagner in the past 100 pages I can't help but agree with his better vision of being born through a national health care system

List 5 interesting aspects of pregnancy and birth discussed in the second hundred pages that you agree deserve wider attention (include page number).
-The atrocity that is the traditional "tribal obstetrics"

-Births not delivered in a hospital only seem dangerous by some statistics because most weren't home births

-Claims made by obstetricians with no factual evidence

-The infant mortality rate in places such as Japan are much smaller compared to the U.S

-Home births are more natural therefore statistically cause less deaths in both the mothers position and child's position

Independently research one crucial factual claim by the author in the second hundred pages and assess the validity of the author's use of that evidence.
"Each year, African American babies die at twice the rate of Caucasian babies."

-After looking at several links, Wagner was correct:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/health/2014374282_babies04.html

http://www.vindy.com/news/2011/mar/10/medical-mystery/

http://blackamericans.com/blogs/news/archive/2011/03/02/death-rate-for-black-babies-in-first-year-twice-as-high.aspx