Elena 
- FOXNews.com – Reports Cast Octuplets’ Mother in Less-Flattering Light – Local News | News Articles | National News | US NewsWow… how do we all manage to do it- raising a child on less than $2.5 million dollars each!tags: finance
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Sophy said the expense of raising 14 children will likely be prohibitive, citing studies that estimate it costs roughly $2.5 million to raise a child to adulthood. Using that math, raising 14 children would cost roughly $35 million.
“And that’s basic stuff,” he said. “That doesn’t include swimming lessons and things like that. It’s very costly and hopefully the planning that needs to be done was done upfront.”
Sophy continued, “14 is a large number of children, so yes, it’ll be 14 times the stress.”
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- FOXNews.com – Home-Birth Advocates Push Pro-Midwife Campaign – Health News | Current Health News | Medical NewsBig push now to make midwifery legal. It only makes sense. tags: homebirth, birth, politics, midwifery
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Nationally, a group called the Big Push for Midwives marked President Barack Obama’s inauguration with an e-mail campaign urging him to ensure that midwives who specialize in home births are included in deliberations on federal health care reform.
“We’re at a tipping point now,” said Katherine Prown, the Big Push campaign manager. “Home births are still only a small part of the total, but it’s poised for growth.”
The campaign seeks to emphasize that in this time of economic crisis, home births can be a safe, satisfying and moneysaving option for many women. But it runs into adamant opposition from the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
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According to the latest federal data, there were only about 25,000 home births nationally in 2006 — most of them assisted by midwives — out of nearly 4.3 million total births.
Midwife-attended home births increased by 27 percent between 1996 and 2006. Home-birth advocates believe the numbers will rise as more states amend their laws to accommodate the practice, which they contend is at least as safe as hospital births for healthy women with low-risk pregnancies.
One of the strengths of the state-by-state campaign is its diversity, Prown said.
“We’re one of the few movements that’s succeeded in bringing together pro-life and pro-choice activists, liberal feminists and Christian conservatives,” she said. “In every state we manage to recruit Republican and Democratic co-sponsors who normally would never be on the same bill together.”
The states are now evenly split on legal recognition of certified professional midwives (CPMs) — those who lack nursing degrees and who account for most midwife-assisted home births
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“There are many in the legislature who feel a need to have this option — they need to be educated,” said Dr. Shastri Swaminathan, the society’s president. “We’re in strong opposition to licensing midwives who don’t have the medical training to provide safe home births.”
Cost is a major element in the debate. A routine hospital birth often can cost $8,000 to $10,000, with higher bills for cesarean section deliveries that now account for 31 percent of U.S. births.
Midwives’ fees for home births are often less than a third of the hospital cost, in part because the mothers generally don’t receive epidural anesthesia or various other medical interventions at home.
For pregnant women, insurance coverage can be a decisive factor in their choice. Many insurers cover care by nurse-midwives in hospitals; coverage is less common for midwives who aren’t nurses or who assist with home births.
Many obstetricians acknowledge that the spiraling cost of maternity care and high rate of C-sections are problems.
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Jane Peterson of Iola, Wis., is an example. She began a midwife apprenticeship in 1980 and has attended more than 1,330 births since then, many of them before she and her counterparts were legally authorized to practice under a 2005 state law.
Peterson, 56, said she strives to develop collaborative relations with local doctors so that transfers to hospitals go smoothly if risk factors develop. She believes such cooperation should be encouraged nationwide, so more women can feel comfortable about choosing home births.
“People will tell you that you changed their lives,” said Peterson, reflecting on the rewards of her job.
“It’s hard work — getting up on a cold winter night, going out one more time through the snow. What keeps you going is the recognition women feel — as though they are a different kind of mother when they’ve been able to give birth their way.”
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- Get Over It: New Deal Didn’t Do the JobThe New Deal didn’t work – and neither will Obama’s Porkulus Package.tags: politics, history
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