JolieSimons.com

TMZ is reporting that the American Medical Association or AMA, and more specifically the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, is issuing a decree against various types of home birth and midwifery, aimed specifically at Ricki Lake.

Why Ricki Lake? Well,this year, Lake helped produce a documentary about the birth industry called The Business of Being Born. The documentary centered around various insiders in the home birth world as well as a few doctors who doubt the efficacy and safety of home births and midwives. The conclusion of the film was, essentially, that the birth industry is being run like a business and women are suffering for it. Infant mortality is very high in this country, higher than in nations that support home birth and midwife options. Countries highly accepting of home birth and midwifery have lower infant mortality rates, lower incidences of cesarean sections, lower birth costs, and generally better conditions for pregnant moms.

Lake’s argument is nothing new, of course. In the film, the director interviews Ina May Gaskin, a famous home birth advocate since the sixties who, over the course of her career, has assisted in the home-based births of thousands of women.

My older brother and I were both born in home-based births and, since I was a child, have heard about the horrors of the medically-controlled birth industry, including the views of Ina May Gaskin. Now, I’m not that old, but am still old enough to know that this was an issue that’s not recent since I was hearing about the ineffective birth industry more than twenty years ago. Now, as an adult, the issue is being revisited by the likes of Lake and Naomi Wolf who, in 2003, published a scathing indictment of the birth industry in her book Misconceptions. Both Wolf and Lake come to similar conclusions: medical intervention is nice, but is not necessary for all women. Home-based birth and midwifery are effective, cheap, and emotionally and physically beneficial to women with normal pregnancies.

Not surprisingly, the AMA has a beef with home births. Think of it this way: the AMA is an organization of doctors that has far too much influence on the medical industry. The AMA is known for opposing many ideas, not for the general health of the populace, but as a self-preservation method. The AMA is interested mostly in the bottom line of doctors, not the health of Americans.

Home births obviously cut into the profits of OB/GYN’s. The average hospital birth can involve steady drips with drugs, a delivery by a doctor, and medical intervention that often leads to cesarean section births rather than preventing them. A cesarean will net the he hospital and OB several thousand dollars extra. While a home birth with a qualified midwife might only cost a few thousand, a vaginal hospital birth will be twice that, and a full medical birth with a pitocin drip, epidural, and cesarean intervention may run up to $8,000 or more.

The AMA’s resolution states that they are trying to write and pass legislation (PDF warning) affirming their belief that hospital births are the safest, the same argument they’ve been giving for years. What they fail to mention in their resolution is the high infant mortality rate that is a very possible result of the large number of hospital births in our nation. The United States ranks 163rd in the work in infant mortality, and nations like Luxemborg, Cuba, Singapore, and South Korea have lower infant mortality rates than the U.S. Is hospital birth really safer with numbers like these?

Lake shot back at the AMA report, telling the AP, quote

“It’s scary that both (the ACOG and the AMA) have sort of targeted me,” Lake told The Associated Press on Tuesday. “And, you know, I’m all about choice. This is not unlike the abortion issue. I am pro-choice when it comes to childbirth and choices in birth. Home birth was around long before hospitals were taking over — and I just think women need to know (the information) so that they can make the best choice for them.”

On the Google News main page, I came across this little gem of bad science. Fox News is reporting that, according to one study, Marijuana is as hard to quit as nicotine. Accompanying the story is a dumb quote, issued by the study’s author, Ryan Vandrey:

““Marijuana is not as innocuous as some people would lead you to believe.”

While this is all well and good, a few important things should be mentioned. First, the study used 12 people, a very small sample size compared to the huge numbers of people that smoked marijuana in the last year, somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 million, according to NORML. Also, this study used exclusively heavy smokers of both cigarettes and marijuana both, and all study participants were students.

Lastly, I thought I’d mention why I believe this is dangerously bad science:

• Dr. Vandrey is famous for authoring numerous studies about the “dangerous” and “addictive” qualities of marijuana. Seems like this guy has a bias.
• The study mentions that these men and women had similarly hard times quitting each of the substances. It was not actually harder to quit marijuana as opposed to tobacco, just similarly hard. It should be noted that cigarettes are still legal while pot is not.
• There is no mention of the fact that previous studies have indicated that marijuana is highly effective in treating pain, symptoms of AIDS patients, symptoms of MS, and many other debilitating diseases.
• Ryan Vandrey is not a medical doctor. He is a research psychologist, not a psychologist that sees patients, mind you.