Last Sunday’s Boston Globe Magazine contained a very disturbing article—in both print and pictures—about a pregnant woman who went to a suburban hospital to give birth, and wound up with a terrible infection.
To me, it relates directly to the discussions we’ve had here about the illnesses of Lauren Herzog and Chris Martin. It’s not certain exactly what made the mother ill, though it seems obvious she got sick from being in the hospital and having a C-section, just like it seems obvious the children got sick from raw milk.
It’s very tempting to conclude from this situation that, if you can be so terribly injured giving birth in a metropolitan-area hospital, you should simply avoid going to the hospital to give birth, just as it’s tempting to conclude from the Herzog-Martin situation that if kids can become so ill, all kids should avoid raw milk.
Of course, the reality is that the vast majority of women who go into the hospital to give birth have no complications. Just like the vast majority of children and adults who consume raw milk have no problems. More than 30,000 in California are consuming it each day, and half a million or more nationally, and how many cases develop into the kinds of situations Lauren’s and Chris’ did? The statistics are at about the same level as the number who contract the kind of infection Monica contracted.
This segment from the Globe Magazine article maybe captures the situation best: ‘A physician with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta says {this is} one of medicine’s great mysteries. "There will always be healthy people who out of the blue have a horrible, heart-wrenching, and devastating infection," says Chris Van Beneden, a medical epidemiologist with the CDC. "The same strain that may cause nothing in you may cause a mild infection in me and devastating illness in someone else."
Now, I am sure that CDC person would never make such a comment about an illness that possibly came from raw milk. But that’s really it in a nutshell. It’s really much of life in a nutshell. There is risk in life of becoming seriously ill. The hospital tried its best. Organic Pastures tried its best. Maybe some error occurred in each place. Maybe an error occurred somewhere else. The problem is you can’t be sure exactly what went wrong.
It’s tough to tell the young mother in the Globe story she lost her limbs because of “risk” the best scientists in the world can’t fully explain. Just as it’s tough to tell the parents of Lauren and Chris the same thing. They don’t want to hear that. In fact, they refuse to hear that. They all want to know the definitive cause, even if it can’t be found. But it usually can. Just look at the Salem Witch Trials for starters.
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Okay, I’ll admit, I’ve probably been way too optimistic about John McCain. And about Obama. (I never was optimistic about Hillary.) I get caught up in the media hype. What can I say?
The comments about the controlling state got me thinking again about a comment posted a little while back by Mellifera about agriculture in Tahiti, quoting an ag extension official: “So, you’re telling me everybody’s self-sufficient and you want to end that? Because… ? No reason was ever given; it was just assumed that more buying and selling was good. Nobody ever looked at the flipside of that argument, which is that taking care of yourself is bad.”
Our entire society is based nearly entirely on continually expanding commerce. Factory farms and the troublesome products they produce are encouraged over family farms, because the former account for more commerce. The biggest danger is “a recession,” which is a slowdown in commerce. Why is that so terrible? Obviously because it might encourage more self sufficiency. Or are we too far removed from our roots to have that happen?
We always hear that young people and old are more susceptible to assaults because of their weakened immune system but what I haven’t seen is statistics on how likely young children as a group are to become ill from a certain threat compared to 40-somethings (a group I’ll be joining soon). That would be interesting. Honestly, for myself I don’t worry at all, though I did pass up an In-N-Out burger the other night. I was part of a norovirus outbreak in July at the La Leche League conference and missed a sushi lunch and some other calories as a result. Perhaps I should contact Bill Marler, but he would probably tell me that the reduced calorie diet is just what I need.
As an aside, we are a three-generation household here and both the generation above and below me would like to buy a milk goat. I did find a booth at the World Ag Expo to register her under NAIS. They make registration real easy. Should we name her Bill? Other suggestions?
Amanda
It is not. Our entire society is based on the idea that if you are not growing, you will lose. Observe pretty much any large corporation – record profits every year, but they have to make even more the next or the stock holders are not happy. This is systemic. People keep buying more, spending more, and wasting more, because gods forbid that anyone not be pushing to get bigger and bigger. And if you work to grow in a small way, or to keep it under control, or (*gasp*) NOT grow, you are seen as some sort of weirdo.
Quite frankly, we need a restart on our economy and our approach to things.
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Amanda Rose – Maybe you should name it Matrix? Or perhaps you could name it Adam Sutler (I’ll give you five extra points if you get that reference).
Now we raw milk users have the same belief that the benifits of the raw milk out wiegh the risks. Why is this an o.k. view for the drug companies and the FDA, but not allowed by those how want to use raw milk?
David: I have been following your blog for 6 months or so and sure do enjoy your prespective on the issues of freedom of choice of food and farming. Thanks
It’s also worth mentioning that the FDA and Pharmaceutical companies use "surrogate endpoints" to measure a drug’s benefit to patients. As we have seen with drugs like Avandia and Zetia, these surrogate endpoints do not always translate into real-world health advantages.
Thank you Steve. I feel it’s sort of preaching to the choir at this blog, but maybe folks will share the link
Modern life is seriously out of step with reality. Do you ever stop to think how it is many people in this world survive, and even thrive, on a tiny fraction of what it takes us. But we call them poor and try to ‘help’ them. Often all we end up doing is wrecking their lives and their economies.
This isn’t just about our personal choices either. Just try and build a house cheap. In much of America you can’t do it, too much regulation. If we had the regulation then we do now most of this country would still be empty frontier. Look at food. Milk production regulations specify lots of concrete. Not only does that drive up the cost of milk production: but it sets up a system which works against the health of the cow. So what you have is a big expensive barn with a mud lot, or with cows walking on long lanes to the barn. Either way you end up with cows walking on concrete, mud, and gravel. And this causes health problems for the cows.
Now look at hospital birth: thousands of dollars to have a baby. How ever did the human race propagate itself before modern hospitals? Why is it that every other species on this planet doesn’t need birth assistance? I have cattle. Some cattlemen went the route of constant monitoring and calving assistance. They ended up with herds which lots of calving problems. Some of those stopped doing it and low and behold suddenly the calving problems went away. Less stress, fewer unneeded interventions, less problems and everyone was happier and healthier.
Back to humans, statistically the less education your birth attendant has the less likely you are to have complications. (i.e. lay midwives are safer than nurse midwives are safer than doctors)
Home births cost only a fraction of hospital births. In general most people view having and raising children as expensive, and for them it is true. It is no coincidence that industrialized nations have lower birth rates. But others who eschew the default ways of doing things have found raising children to be very cheap.
As to the vast majority who have hospital births not having complications; that all depends on what you call a complication and what you consider normal. Is constant intervention normal? Are drugs, c-sections, early cord clamping and high stress strange environments normal?
You are right about the role of diet. That is one big part of it. But there are many other factors at work also such as inducing early, the hospital environment, societal expectations, etc.
The first link shows "The Maternal Mortality Ratio".
http://ph.state.al.us/chs/HealthStatistics/Reports/Pregnancy%20Related%20Mortality.pdf
This 2nd link gives a short history of Alabama’s maternal shortfalls and attempts to correct. Women die each year in the US from complications of pregnancy, whether they have an attendent, licensed professional or go it alone.
Elizabeth, are you referring to the problem of obesity duing pregnancy/birthing as the alteration in a woman’s body?
England, I believe still uses midwives and has more home births than the US. I don’t know the stats on complications there.
As Americans, I believe we should be self-sufficient. The US has or at least it had the ability, I don’t know why or how the loss began. We are what we eat, the chemicals in and on foods and in our environment cannot be safe, especially in constant doses. Trying to avoid and/or eliminate them is very difficult.
There is a lot one can do to avoid problems in the diet. It is doable, though there are a few chemicals so pervasive as to be difficult to avoid.
I believe this is what Elizabeth is referring to:
"Although Price was only able to stay a short time with the indigenous groups he examined, he was sometimes able to obtain important statistics from physicians who practiced among these groups. In this way, he obtained limited data suggesting that nutrition influenced cancer and the ease of childbirth in the same way it influenced tooth decay, tuberculosis, pneumonia and heart disease.
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In Alaska, however, Price obtained data concerning the effect of diet on the ease of childbirth that was not subject to the confounding effect of genetics. The superintendent of the government hospital in Anchorage reported that in his thirty-six years of experience, the native women gave birth with such ease that he was rarely able to reach them in time to witness a birth. In the most recent generation of young women who had grown up during the shift to a modernized diet, however, the women frequently required the assistance of the hospital after spending days in labor."
http://www.cholesterol-and-health.com/Campbell-Masterjohn.html
I know that diet can have an impact on skeletal development in the womb. I had not read that nutrition can cause a narrowing of the pelvic girdle, I would have thought that was genetic. The body usually takes 100s of years to mutate; some say the little toe is shrinking. Looking at statues from the 1100s, they look the same as today. People are taller, I believe from better nutrition. It would be interesting to research. As would the affects of nutrition and the birthing process.
http://weber.ucsd.edu/~dkjordan/resources/clarifications/HumanBirth.html
This site gives a brief description of the pelvic anatomy before, during and after birth.
The Weston Price’ web site, is on my "to read" list. I’m going to be politically incorrect for a moment- Mr. Price judges some labors as "easy"? What does a man know of it? Birthing is hard work. Something he will never experience (I may have to recant those words someday with the genetic manuvering man is doing). My dad says passing a kidney stone is worse than anything, even birth…I’ve passed stones and given birth. I roll my eyes at Dad and shake my head at the whimpiness of men.
"Natural" childbirth can be a "good" experience. I don’t know what they are teaching young women now-a-days, so I cannot give an opinion. I would hope that they are taught/learn of what to expect,and that just because something doesn’t work as planned, it does not mean that it was a failure on anyones part. The only "perfect" delivery I know of is that both mom and baby are healthy.
The "right thing" is what you believe. It isn’t what someone else pushes on you. My friend wanted to be doped up when she had her kids, she was looped for days. It was not what I would have chosen, it was "right" for her. It is a shame small-minded people cause others to feel inadequate when a different path is chosen.
Pete, I agree that diet can have an effect on many things. On childbirth, culture, lifestyle and beliefs can also have an impact. Keep in mind that each person and each birth is different. If you are laying flat on your back and that baby’s head is moving down the birth canal, gravity, along with the natural shifting of the pelvic girdle, gravity is pulling that head towards the floor. The weight of the head is pushing on the tail bone, pulling on ligaments and tendons,the birth canal when laying on your back is angled in an up-wards direction, causing the head to be forced against gravity, the weight of the head and body exherts more pressure posteriorly on the opening, causing more tears (epesiotomies(sp), some 3rd degree tears (deep tissue). Some docs use those huge forceps, etc. Women/our society are taught that you "need" medical intervention. I’m not advocating not to use medical intervention. I’m advocating for everyone to be taught correctly so that they can make informed decisions about their health/life.
(Sorry for the long post)
Narrow pelvic cavities are genetic. The male or the female may have someone in his/her ancestry that had narrow hips, it may be sporatic showing up in future generations. Like the ability to roll your tongue, or attached earlobes.
Diet has huge effects on all aspects of skeletal structure. Price’s book Nutrition and Physical Degeneration talks about it. But I’ve also got a livestock book detailing the affect of different feeding rates on the development of skeletal structure of pigs. The differences are stark.
The problem is we as a society have our blinders on. We think what we experience and what we see around us is normal. We think we are the peak of human advancement and that our health is better than ever. How so very wrong we are.
No, I’ve not given birth. But my wife has, both naturally and with pitocin. And as the one who got her through both of them I’ll tell you there was a world of difference. I fully understand a person’s need for drugs if they induce. The problem is the vast majority of the time there is no need to induce in the first place. And yet more and more are doing it for increasingly transient reasons.
I could go on and on about birth statistics in the United States, but suffice to say we have the highest newborn and maternal mortality rate in the developed world, and we spend many times more than any other country on childbirth.
If you haven’t seen The Business of Being Born, the new documentary by Ricki Lake, I highly recommend it. Also, check out What Babies Want, another documentary. Both life-changing.
I am reading Sandra Steingraber’s book, Having Faith: An ecologist’s journey to motherhood, and she addresses this whole pelvis issue. According to her, forceps were invented to help with all of the post-industrial revolution births, as the women had had poor nutrition and inadequate sunlight as youths, and their pelvic bones were undeveloped and too narrow.
And I am glad others have mentioned Price’s work. So much of what we talk about being "genetic" today is an unscientific cop-out. It’s most often nutritional deficiencies, many of which could be erased, ironically, with grass-fed raw milk.
Suzanne is right, the US does have a high newborn and maternal mortality rate.