Please go to the website listed to sign a petition to once again fund Birth Centers in Texas.
www.birthcenters.org
Recently legislation has been passed ending the funding of Medicaid to Birth Centers in Texas. This is such a tragedy for many reasons.
1. This was certainly not motivated by a desire for fiscally responsible government. Birth Center births are far less expensive and also have much lower C-section rates.
2. Medicaid funding gives low income women the option for out of hospital births. Most midwives already do not accept Medicaid for home birth because the pay is so little.
3. Cutting off this funding could potentially put some Birth Centers out of business. Those that accept Medicaid are limited already because Medicaid does not pay as well as insurance.
4. It will force more women to either birth in Texas hospitals (which frankly are shameful in their treatment of women and their disgusting interventions).
5. It will hurt babies and women as those hospital births have higher C-section rates, NICU stays, interventions, and drugs.
I am grateful that when I lived in Texas I had the option of a wonderful Birth Center birth at Inanna Birth Center in Denton. I could not afford a home birth and was not willing to birth in the nearby Texas hospitals. The ones closest to me had C-section rates of 50%, induction rates around 95% and epidural rates close to 100%. Successful breastfeeding was rare, and women were still delivering in stirrups, with episitiomeys, continuous fetal monitoring, and IV were standard.
Please sign the petition to find Birth Centers again in Texas.
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