Legislation Would Allow Non-Midwives To Regulate Them

Midwifery is an ancient profession, providing care for women during pregnancy and birth. Midwifery being under attack is nothing new. Obstetricians, hospitals, and big pharma have been over-medicalizing the natural process of birth for over 100 years now. Many people are led to believe that birth with a midwife is dangerous and that they would be safer in a hospital. For low-risk women, the opposite is actually true. Only 5.2% of women under the care of midwives required cesarean section and only 1% of babies required transfer to hospital after birth. With over 31% of babies born by cesarean section under obstetrical care, one could argue that hospitals are not the safest place to give birth. 

So, you might be wondering, what does midwifery have to do with liberty? The state and the medical-industrial complex try to control our lives before we are even born. Homebirth and midwifery are ways to take that power back and allow our children to be brought into this world in a natural and free way. 

The legislation is called HB1061 and will have a public hearing at the House Executive Departments and Administration Committee on Thursday, January 20th at 1 pm in Concord New Hampshire at the Legislative office building. This legislation is not a step in the right direction for liberty or health freedom. The Office of Professional Licensure and Certification (OPLC) claims that with this bill they would just be doing “admin work”. Based on the actual text from this bill, that would not be the case. It appears that this bill has the intention of taking control of midwifery out of the hands of New Hampshire midwives and placing it into the hands of Obstetricians and state regulators. Since there is some confusion about its content, let’s use actual quotes from this bill. 

“This bill makes the midwifery council an advisory board to the executive director of the office of professional licensure and certification. The executive director shall establish an advisory midwifery council consisting of 3 members. Two members shall be New Hampshire licensed physicians or advanced practice registered nurses with experience in obstetrics. One member shall be a midwife certified under this chapter.” 

 “This bill is a request of the office of professional licensure and certification.” 

Do you know what Obstetricians and the OPLC know about home birth or midwifery? 

Nothing!

The excuse the current midwifery council was given for this power shift was “the midwifery council is too small and runs the risk of being sued”. Here’s a solution for that. Get rid of the midwifery council, certification, licensure, and regulations altogether! That’s the real issue here. Requiring midwives to be certified and licensed by the state has nothing to do with safety. It’s about control and money. 

New Hampshire has stricter laws regarding midwifery and homebirth than Massachusetts and Connecticut! Now that’s just embarrassing! This is not only a threat for midwives, this is a threat for women, families, and freedom. 

If you care about this issue, come to the Legislative Office Building in Concord on January 20th at 1 pm to show your support of New Hampshire midwives, for women, and freedom.

You can also email and call the committee members and the sponsors of this bill and tell them that you do not support the OPLC being in charge of the midwifery council. You could politely explain what you don’t like about the bill, and ask them to amend it, possibly to abolish the requirement for midwives to ask politicians for permission to do their job altogether! 

SPONSORS: Rep. McGuire, Merr. 29; Rep. Goley, Hills. 8; Rep. Schuett, Merr. 20; Rep. P. Schmidt, Straf. 19

HouseExecutiveDepartmentsandAdministration@leg.state.nh.us sends an email to all members of the committee.

You can also use the ‘remote sign-in‘ online tool to let the committee know that you don’t support the bill.