I read with interest the recent article in The Guardian provided an update as to the ever escalating rate of cesarean section births in Australia. The article makes all of the well-known [predictable?] arguments in favor of natural delivery.
It is true, the divergence between cesarean section rates in Australia and the World Health Organization’s recommended rate is remarkable.
Unfortunately, what the article does not do (and much of the debate ignores), is a ‘risk-benefit’ comparison of the two options of cesarean versus a natural delivery (in other than high-risk pregnancies). The truth is that there are risks (and benefits) involved with either option. While public perception in this century tends to ignore this; the simple fact is that childbirth is not [yet] a risk-free process, whichever mode of delivery is preferred.
The most interesting issue, not tackled by the article, is why the divergence of rates?
This must result from the relative weighting applied to the pros and cons of the two alternatives, by contemporary Australian society [and mothers]. Obviously, such weighting diverges from the weighting the WHO considers ‘appropriate.’ The really interesting question is what are the factors leading women to increasingly frequently choose caesarian as their mode of preference?
The law in Australia has for a long time (and in the UK more recently) recognized that healthcare choices, including mode of delivery, are for the patient to make, on a properly informed basis. They are not to be dictated by the health professional, the WHO, or population-based policy, at a government level. This is complicated by the fact that the mother is actually making a choice for 2 rather than 1 person. An intriguing (near unique) legal issue is the question of the mother’s obligations when making such choice to weigh the competing pros and cons from her and her child’s perspective. It is clear that in some respects, the unborn child’s interests may point towards one option while the mother’s preference may lie elsewhere.
The “appropriate” rate for cesarean sections in Australia is to be determined by the rate at which properly informed mothers make their choice, one way or the other.
If there is concern at such rate, the ‘answer,’ if there is one, is to better educate parents, to ‘assist’ them to make sensible decisions as to the weight to be attached to the respective pros and cons of one mode of delivery and the other. To do so, once again, requires that this information be clear. To me at least, this is not yet the case in this debate.
