by Daniela Drandic | May 4, 2021 | Advocacy, Basic human rights, Get Involved, HRiC In Action
HRiC is forming a global network of lawyers, researchers and advocates dedicated to improving maternity care – everywhere. Join us!
Human Rights in Childbirth (HRiC) is developing a new strategy to inform our advocacy and strategic direction over the next three years.
Our goal is to develop a sustainable network of key stakeholders in order to make full use of, and build on, our collective skills and capacity to defend maternal and infant rights at the global level and inform advocacy at the regional and national level. We will refer to this network as the Key Stakeholder Advisory Group (KSAG).
We aim to hold inclusive online meetings which focus on different issues affecting different regions and which offer an opportunity for engagement across and between regional representatives. We seek to build a sustainable forum aimed at increasing our capacity and empowering stakeholders. You can read our detailed Terms of Reference here, to get a better understanding of the project.
To submit your interest, please complete this survey by 15 May 2021.
Please share this opportunity as far and wide as possible through your networks. Questions can be forwarded to info@humanrightsinchildbirth.org
We look forward to working with you!
by Bashi Hazard | Aug 26, 2018 | Basic human rights
Human rights instruments have always provided the means to protect the full spectrum of reproductive rights available to women, pregnant or otherwise. Despite that, there remains substantial confusion and disagreement about the scope and unfettered application of those rights amongst healthcare providers, government administrators and even amongst advocates of reproductive rights. This is having a profound effect on mothers and babies.
“Human rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are human rights, once and for all”
Hillary Rodham Clinton, 4th World Conference on Women, Beijing 1995
Twenty three years ago, when Hillary Clinton first uttered these words, they gained a popularity that can only be described as the modern day equivalent of a social media post “going viral”.
In fact, Mrs Clinton knew these words were neither novel nor new even as she spoke them. In 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights described “all human beings” – men and women – as being born free and equal in dignity and rights.
In 1979, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) was adopted by the UN General Assembly, which defines discrimination as:
“… any distinction, exclusion or restriction made on the basis of sex which has the effect or purpose of impairing or nullifying the recognition, enjoyment or exercise by women, irrespective of their marital status, on a basis of equality of men and women, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural, civil or any other field.”
Mrs Clinton was simply restating a forgotten fact. Seventy years after receiving that first written mandate for equality and equity, women are still restating that forgotten fact. In no other category of women’s human rights is that fact as overlooked, or as conveniently forgotten, as the reproductive rights of women.
The reproductive rights of women and girls remain as contentious, as bitterly disputed and as vulnerable to the failings and foibles of male-dominated religious and political institutions today, as they were before the United Nations was brought into being.
The ability to conceive and bear children is unique to women. Yet, in countries rich and poor, every stage of a girl’s or woman’s reproductive life cycle is vulnerable to illegal trade, inappropriate sexualisation, violence, abuse, coercion, manipulation and control, in violation of her fundamental human rights.
To restrict or fetter a woman’s reproductive rights and freedoms not only affects her human rights in that field, it also impacts on the freedoms and rights that she enjoys in other fields, such as the right to work or the right to an education. It is a discrimination that does not affect men. In some cases, it will amount to a criminal offence. This is the case regardless of whether a woman is asserting control over her own fertility, seeking a termination of pregnancy, requesting healthcare to support her pregnancy and birth, or choosing the circumstances of her birth.
Human rights instruments have always provided the means to protect the full spectrum of reproductive rights available to women, pregnant or otherwise. Despite that, there remains substantial confusion and disagreement about the scope and unfettered application of those rights amongst healthcare providers, government administrators and even amongst advocates of reproductive rights. This is having a profound effect on mothers and babies.
HRiC is working to stem this confusion – by providing clarity on the rights of pregnant and birthing women, and by convening multi-stakeholder engagements between midwives, doctors, lawyers, legal administrators and consumers.
- Imagine…a maternity care facility structured around the needs of pregnant women and their families, as opposed to the needs of administrators or care providers?
- Imagine…midwives who work within communities to provide ante-, intra- and post-partum care for mothers and infants? Who advocate on behalf of families seeking medical services? Where bullying, coercion and disrespect are not acceptable? Where women don’t react with frustration, fear, suspicion or resistance?
- Imagine working in a facility in which the women under your care not only survived but thrived? Where you would not have to mislead, deceive or force a distressed woman into doing what you think is best? Where you are not afraid to find solutions that support her, without losing your job or facing censure from your colleagues?
In the short term, these aspirations could be easily achieved, with very little added costs, by simply honouring and observing the basic human rights of all women in pregnancy and birth. All that is required is a change in perception and, consequently, a change in attitude. In the long term, these aspirations could contribute to a reduction in maternal and infant mortality and morbidity, enhance the health and wellbeing of families and communities, and reduce the burden on public health systems left to manage the impact that a pregnant woman’s pain and suffering has on everyone around her.
In the pages that follow, you will have the opportunity to review and learn about some of the rights of pregnant and birthing women, the source of those rights and how to assert them for yourself or. If nothing else, it will leave you with a clear and unequivocal realisation that a woman does not relinquish her human rights by carrying a pregnancy to term. We hope that it will also inspire you to join us in protecting the full spectrum of reproductive rights that should be enjoyed by all women around the world.
HRiC Board Member and Lawyer
Bashi Kumar Hazard is a lawyer whose focus in law expanded soon after she had her first child. From her own experiences, Bashi became aware of the widespread impact of current obstetric models of care on the emotional health and wellbeing of mothers. That awareness took her back to working with fundamental ethical principles and human rights law, and forming networks with human rights lawyers in the USA, Netherlands, UK and Europe, with whom she now works closely to develop a legal discourse about the human rights of women in pregnancy and childbirth. Since then, Bashi has presented papers and keynote speeches at many significant conferences on the topic of human rights in childbirth.
by Daniela Drandic | Jun 28, 2018 | Basic human rights
President of Hungary János Áder has just granted clemancy (presidential pardon) to physician and independent midwife Dr Ágnes Geréb. Clemency means that Dr Gereb does not have to serve the prison sentence she received a few months ago. However, the President did not remove the legal burden of being a convicted felon, and the long suspension of Dr. Gereb’s medical and midwifery licenses.
HRIC has been following Dr. Gereb’s case from its very beginning. Her story (and ensuing case on the right to assisted home birth at the European Court of Human Rights where her client, Anna Ternovsky, was a party) was instrumental in convening the first Human Rights in Childbirth Conference in the Hague, Netherlands, and the consequent foundation of Human Rights in Childbirth. Her pioneering work in Hungary has helped that country’s maternity system move forward immensely. In the 1970s as a young resident in obstetrics, she helped fathers sneak into hospital birthing rooms and began advocating for more respectful birth practices. Later, in the 1990s she began running independent childbirth education and support services and working as an independent home birth midwife, supporting families who wanted to birth in out of hospital settings.
Dr. Gereb’s statement after the President’s announcement demonstrates her enormous heart and passion for respectful, woman-centred maternity care:
“This act of clemency is about more than me. It is an acknowledgement of liberty in giving birth. It is a recognition by the state that the rights of women to make decisions about the circumstances of their children’s birth must be acknowledged.”
HRiC Board Member
Daniela Drandić is Reproductive Rights Program Lead at Croatia’s largest parents’ NGO, Roda – Parents in Action. She is a maternity rights advocate and is currently working on her M.Sc. in Maternal and Infant Health.
by jason | Jun 14, 2018 | Basic human rights
In some parts of the world, women’s movements have overcome significant opposition to secure basic political, economic, and reproductive rights, like the right to go to school, and to choose whether to conceive and bear children.
In other parts of the world, even these basic rights are a work in progress.
In recent years, there has been an emerging international recognition that human rights are at stake in maternity care. The human rights framework is a valuable tool for understanding the global problem of maternal mortality, morbidity, and perinatal mortality, and the obligations of governments to provide maternity care that is accessible and affordable to all citizens.
It is also helpful to understand the dynamics that occur between birthing women and their healthcare providers, and problems with medical intervention and abuse including the skyrocketing cesarean section rate.
“Some women are aware of the risks and potential benefits of these interventions and, backed by their support people, make a stand during labour against intervention. ”
BASHI HAZARD
HRiC Board member
…for these rights to be recognised and implemented, in law and practice, for birthing women everywhere.
For that to happen will require activism and advocacy. Work with the network in your own nation to figure out what these rights mean there, and to advocate for their more perfect realisation, as necessary.
by Daniela Drandic | Jan 9, 2018 | Basic human rights, Healthcare Professionals
Agnes Gereb, pioneering obstetrician and independent midwife, has been sentenced to two years in prison with no chance of appeal.
Trailblazers like Agnes, who dedicate their life’s work to making change that benefits mothers and babies, should be celebrated and not punished. Unfortunately, this is often not the case, and Agnes’ case is no different.
Immediately after graduating from the University of Szeged in 1977, she began working as an obstetrician-gynaecologist in a hospital practice. She was one of the first physicians in Hungary who welcomed fathers into the birthing room, a practice that was denounced by her colleagues.
Later, she began working as a home birth midwife, and before her arrest in 2010 attended over 3000 births. At the time, home birth was not regulated by the Hungarian government, and although not officially illegal, it was not legal either.
Agnes’ arrest was the result of two adverse outcomes at home births, outcomes which, had they happened in a hospital setting, would not have resulted in criminal prosecution, but would instead have been investigated by professional organisations, and dealt with through disciplinary sanctions if necessary.
Upon receiving information about the conviction, Agnes issued the following statement:
These lawsuits and criminal proceedings against me are actually about the fact that there has been an increasing societal need for home births. The right to these could not be suddenly accepted in a situation where, for decades, the bribery-based medical establishment dismissed the expert truths that were linked to my person…The solution has been to violently push me aside as the ‘black sheep’ of home-birthing, without whom the previously ‘dangerous and prosecutable’ practice can be viewed as nice and good.
Public Reactions in Hungary
Agnes Gereb is a controversial figure in Hungary; on the one hand man feel she is being persecuted because of her work to humanise maternity practices and begin offering home birth services, as is the norm in other European countries. Her experience as both an obstetrician and midwife mean that she has the unique expertise do deal with complications that can arise in childbirth. On the other hand, many groups in Hungary insist that the only acceptable place for birth is a hospital setting, attended by obstetricians who practice active management of labour and delivery.
If you would like to support Agnes Gereb, sign the petition to the President of Hungary to grant her clemency.
https://www.change.org/p/please-grant-full-clemency-to-dr-midwife-agnes-gereb
by Daniela Drandic | Nov 27, 2017 | Basic human rights
By Daniela Drandic
The Italian Association of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (AOGOI) has issued an official reaction to the research on obstetric violence commissioned by the Obstetric Violence Observatory (OVO-Italia).
In the face of harsh evidence that obstetric violence is a problem in Italy, this professional organisation has instead decided to deny the fact that it exists. Unfortunately, this is something that we have seen play out in other countries as well.
Problems can only be solved if all stakeholders come together to solve them. By ignoring the problem, the Italian Association of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists is doing the exact opposite.
A translation of the statement is provided below, thank you to Daniela Torrisi for taking the time to translate it for an English-speaking audience. The original statement can be found on the AOGOI website.
http://www.aogoi.it/notiziario/inchiesta-doxa-sulla-violenza-ostetrica-campagna-basta-tacere-vs-documentazione-diffusa/
DOXA investigation into “obstetric violence” campaign #BastaTacere (Break the Silence) vs. diffuse documentation
Recently papers and inquiries regarding “stories of obstetric violence” in Italy, together with the statement that there are data about it, have been brought to the attention of the Aogoi (Italian Association of Obstetricians-Gynaecologists)
It is clear that the modality of presentation of the inquiry, which puts together the words “violence” and “obstetric”, implies a severe derogatory effect for the professionals of the sector.
In facts, the words “obstetric violence”, at the time of communication, are on their own immediate means of offence of the reputation of healthcare professionals, transcending into patent attack and aggression of the moral sphere of other, and it certainly does not constitute a generic and licit content of evaluation or expression of an opinion respectful of the correctness of the language and allowed by our laws.
The “first national research realised by Doxa for the Observatory on obstetric violence in Italy in collaboration with the associations “la Goccia Magica” and “CiaoLapo Onlus” [a civil society organisation] and it denounces that 21% of Italian others with children between 0-14 yo allegedly have been subjected to physical or verbal abuse during delivery or other actions against their psychophysical dignity.
In the disseminated document extremely offensive expressions which refer to deplorable behaviours allegedly pertaining to the professional profiles of midwives, obs-gynae and healthcare support workers), which never took place and have never been proved, inducing in the mind of the reader an unfair and intolerable complete distortion of the Italian healthcare reality and in particular of the maternity care, which obtains a severely defamatory and damaging of the professionals’ reputation. They use many quotes and connotated description with completely no basis whatsoever, as much as less direct expressions but not less dangerous because insidious and suggestive, where they discuss about Italian mothers who would allegedly have been victims of some form of physical or psychological violence by maternity providers or who would allegedly have received delivery care damaging for their dignity and psychophysical integrity.
Healthcare providers, doctors and midwives, are accused of performing sneaky episiotomies, needlessly and damaging, describing the practice as genital mutilation, maiming their vaginas and perineums with “no reason or usefulness”. The description is that of a desolate panorama, even with numbers and rates, of women who, when they are not the victims of sadistic and inconsiderate violence, they are abandoned, neglected, left alone under the human and assistential point of view, at risk of their life. The conclusion is that the acts of violence, the damage inflicted, the behaviours against dignity and privacy are allegedly the reason for the decrease in the birth rate in Italy, for the consequent decision of women not to have more children after the first.
It is apparent that the seriousness of this false reconstruction of Italian healthcare which is made of midwives and obstetrician-gynaecologists who are sadistic or neglecting of the patients, who, reap victims out of sheer cruelty. The discredit spread on the whole healthcare professionals, on the Italian public healthcare system and in particular on the staff present in the delivery units of our hospitals, to their decorum and to their reputation, the unfounded statements, describing an assistance to delivery which is inhumane, barbaric and tyrannical, is completely censurable e and reprehensible and there cannot be any extenuating circumstance or any justification under the pretext of social usefulness or duty of information of the public.
The conduct appears even more serious for the refusal of a debate and of explanations, when at the request of clarifications on the regrettable situation and at the request of disclosing the source of the data and rates which have been disseminated, the answer was a refusal motivated by the unwillingness of the responsible of the study.
It can be deducted by the disseminated documents that the research by Doxa was commissioned by the “observatory on obstetric violence” founded by Alessandra Battisti and Elena Skoko) and was funded by the associations “La Goccia Magica” and “CiaoLapo Onlus”, that the initiative represents the continuation and evolution of the information and awareness raising campaign “bastatacere: le madri hanno voce” and that it supports the law proposal to make obstetric violence recognised as a crime by MP Zaccagnini and Senator Romani, against a “submerse phenomenon” which “scars for life the victims” who even decide not to have more children for the consequences of the trauma.
The unequivocal reference to extremely serious facts and circumstances allegedly attributed to the maternity healthcare staff, midwives and doctors, through “direct accounts” of mothers all in anonymity, the alarming data and percentage without identifications of the sources from which they were extracted, make the sneaky derogatory campaign even more reprehensible and disgusting because it does not leave any space to confute and reply.
The political agenda and the financial advantages revealed by unequivocal circumstances raise complex and legitimate suspicions.
- the campaign “bastatacere” is linked to the proposal of law “Norms for the protection of the rights of the delivering mother, of the newborn and for the promotion of physiological birth” to support the recognition of obstetric violence as a crime in Italy.
- at the end of the awareness raising campaign the Observatory on obstetric violence in Italy (OVOItalia) to continue the collection of witness accounts of violence against delivering mothers during labour and delivery
- Anybody can concretely support the awareness raising activities, the information efforts and the research of the OVOItalia and the campaign “bastatacere: le madri hanno voce” with a voluntary contribution through La Goccia Magica on their website http://www.lagocciamagica.it or to the IBAN IT68Z0895139130000000344705, reference #bastatacere.
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