New Date for MAMA Campaign Webinar

MAMA Has Good News to Share!

Join Us for a Webinar on December 3rd
Click to Register

Our federal lobbyist, Billy Wynne will join representatives from the
Campaign Steering Committee, on Thursday, December 3rd, for an exciting
webinar about the MAMA Campaign at 8 pm EST. Please note that this is a
new date. The webinar was previously scheduled for the beginning of
Thanksgiving week, but that week was too busy for too many of our supporters
so we have postponed the date a week to accommodate our supporters.

MAMA has good news to share! The effort to secure federal recognition of
CPMs got a big boost this week - language beneficial to CPMs is included in
the Senate health care bill just released on Wednesday, November 18th.
And MAMA is still hard at work to include our amendment to reimburse CPMs in
the federal Medicaid program in the final bill that will go to the President
to be signed early next year.

You are invited to join us to hear:
* What this new language in the Senate bill will mean for midwives and
mothers across the country

* The impressive support for CPMs that MAMA has built among key
legislators over the last six months, that will serve midwives and
mothers well for years to come

* About the most successful fundraising campaign for midwifery ever!

* What the next steps are this year for Federal recognition for CPMs

It is easy to participate in the webinar! Click to register and receive easy steps to join us.
And during the webinar MAMA wants to answer your questions: email a
question to info@mamacampaign.org and put "Webinar Question Submission" in
the subject line.

We look forward to your participation!

MAMA thanks you for your support. If you have any questions, concerns or
comments please contact the campaign at info@mamacampaign.org.

Varying Opinions on Midwifery Licensure

As an organization, Citizens for Midwifery supports the Big Push campaign and is also a partner in the MAMA campaign. However, I think it important to acknowledge that there are strong differences of opinion within the "birth world" about legislative "solutions" in midwifery. I frequently post updates and alerts from various campaigns to this blog. However, there are women who caution that licensing and legislation have unforeseen consequences and I think it is both fair and important to listen to their voices too.

Carla Hartley and Gloria Lemay are women that I admire and respect and both of them have recently voiced their concerns via their blogs about licensing midwives.

Gloria made a thoughtful post titled Licensing, registering and certifying midwives–at what cost?

And Carla has made a couple of quick posts about licensing and also re: malpractice insurance.

My personal feelings about midwifery legislation were deeply shaped by the experiences of living in Missouri for my entire life, in which until last year, the practice of midwifery was a felony. A felony is a serious thing and our intense legislative efforts in Missouri were able to remove that obstacle. There are those who expressed concern about taking a legislative approach, feeling that it was better to leave things as they were and cautioning that legislation has its own risks. I think it certainly is important to be mindful of risks, but I also feel (and felt) very strongly that leaving midwifery a felony was the worst possible tactic to take. I take an, "anything is better than midwives being FELONS!" perspective. Additionally, I felt strongly that it was unethical, impractical, and illogical to assume and trust that another woman would be willing to break the law for me and my family by attending my births--that is a LOT to expect from another woman and from her family, who is by extension also put at significant risk. I couldn't ethically continue to expect that. I do not claim to know for certain if pushing for licensure is the correct answer for every state, however, and I find it important to listen to both sides of the issue. There are a lot of very informed people working on legislative campaigns and I place a great deal of trust in their wisdom and expertise! I also believe that they have the best interests of the consumer at heart.

--
Molly
CfM Blogger