We must stop the government’s willful destruction of our national maternity care

NHS staff and patients should not stay silent. It is time to demand an end to the willful destruction of our national maternity care before we see further tragedy, writes Jessica Ormerod, former Lay Chair of of Lewisham’s Maternity Services Liaison Committee which represents the interests of Lewisham women and their infants.

A coroner’s finding that baby Kristian Jaworski  died because his mother was denied a caesarean section due to cost is shocking. There can be no recompense for such a tragedy for this family; the least that can be offered them is the certainty that this will never happen again. But the senior coroner Andrew Walker has warned the Department of Health:

“there is a risk that future deaths will occur unless action is taken”.

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The rose-tinted privatisation of maternity services is under way

This is a question I’ve been meaning to ask the Clinical Commissioning Groups at the hospital cuts consultation drop ins:

  • Where are the community midwives coming from to provide the increased home births proposed in the Right Care Right Time Right Place Have Your Say Consultation Doc (p30)?
  • And are the CCGs relying on the recommendations of the National Maternity Review, that women employ private midwives through the £3k voucher scheme? And what happens to such women if things go wrong in labour and they need specialist obstetric help which will cost far more than £3k?

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