'Wealthy white' caesareans worry midwives

Wealthy white women are putting their and their babies' lives at risk by insisting on unnecessary caesarean operations, the Midwifery Council said yesterday.

Deputy chairman Sharron Cole told the midwives' conference in Christchurch that women were handing over control to doctors in the belief that medicine and technology would give them better outcomes than trusting in their own ability to give birth.

"There is a bitter irony in this in that there is good evidence to show that intervention, particularly caesarean section where it is clinically unnecessary, is more dangerous for mother and baby," Ms Cole said.

Because of the increasing number of caesarean sections being carried out in the absence of any clinical risk factors, it was inevitable that women and babies would die as a result of the unnecessary procedure, she said.

- NZPA