WEBVTT

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[music]

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[music]

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Look at this scene carefully.

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It is a typical hospital birth repeated
every minute of every day around the world.

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The woman has become
exhausted by a long labor.

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The doctor has decided to use forceps
to bring the baby to the world.

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The mother her legs in stirrups has
received nitrous oxide to numb the pain.

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[sil.]

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The baby is healthy though exhausted.

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Now after his ordeal, he wants more
than anything to be held by his mother.

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More than anything, the mother
wants to hold her child,

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but medical procedure here is to separate
them and take the baby for (inaudible) tests.

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To one man, it is a pattern that has
been repeated throughout history.

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Of course, Muslim(ph) culture has followed tricks
to alter the well-being of the newborn baby,

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rituals like, early baptism in cold water,

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tight swaddling, foot binding,
piercing the ears of the… of the girls

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just after the birth, like (inaudible).

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It\'s exactly what\'s happening in a hospitals as
soon as baby is born. Now always many excuses

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to pick up the baby, for example,
washing to cut the chord.

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Putting some drops in the baby\'s
eyes, washing the baby right away,

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touching(ph), doing some test,
putting the tube in the stomach,

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all these medical procedures are,

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in fact, absolutely irrational.

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Michel Odent is a French doctor who believes that
separation at birth has a profound significance.

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When society replaces

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the mother\'s hands with its own, it
imbues the child with its values

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and wrapped in the customs of the tribe
the baby loses contact with its roots.

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[non-English narration]

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Michel believes that if we transform birth,

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it can transform the world.

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Up to now, the dogma, the doctrine,

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the watch world was to dominate
the… the other living creatures,

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to dominate plants, to dominate
animals, to dominate Mother Earth.

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Suddenly, during this century, and
this is the big event of this century,

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we have discovered that
we are a part of nature

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and we have discovered that we have
to change radically our priority.

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E have discovered that now our
priority should be to learn

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how to develop more
respect for Mother Earth.

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[music]

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Michel has been involved with
birth in most of his life.

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He believes that true birth, we can understand
human nature and by understanding human nature

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we can change the way babies are born. His
story begins in a hospital, in Pithiviers,

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a small market town south of Paris.

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For 20 years, he ran its maternity unit and
became famous for his (inaudible) techniques.

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He created a private intimate environment

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where standing or squatting,
women actively gave birth.

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[music]

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That room was very dark and quiet and I think
he really showed us that the childbirth,

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that labor was actually a sacred
process, and one got the sense

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of the respect for the process of
childbirth, and actually it worked.

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I think he was the first person to actually
say this works, if you just sit and wait.

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I mean, when you saw delivering a breach, you
thought, \"Ah! That\'s how it could look like,\"

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and you suddenly realize that actually the breaches you\'d
seen delivered was when the woman was upside down,

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that the whole process is crazy if
the woman is lying flat on her back,

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whether public diameters decrease
because of the way she\'s lying.

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So we gave speeches all over
Holland and… and showed slides

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f vertical birth and this
was all inspired by Michel.

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But that\'s what really gets up, you
know, it (inaudible) came from a man.

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[sil.]

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So this is the kind of birthing home

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we found it useful to design,
interest home-like place.

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It\'s a small home, you
know, attract more easily,

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feeling of privacy in a… in a small place.
In French, we used to call

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this birthing (inaudible),

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it means a place where there is nothing
special. There is no medical equipment visible,

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no visible (inaudible) for
listening to a baby\'s heartbeat,

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just to use an old traditional way

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and we found that many details where important
to create an atmosphere for (inaudible).

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For example, it\'s much better
when (inaudible) looks perfectly,

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normally when there\'s some… some disorder.
So that\'s why we\'re

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just creating disorder just by myself, you know,
thinking you can make the atmosphere different.

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We give some importance to…
to… also to the possibility

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to close the curtains and
to make the… the dark.

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Pithiviers also became the
first public hospital

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to offer birthing pool as
part of its facilities

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at a time when technology and drugs
were being increasingly used elsewhere.

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[music]

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Michel saw that many women

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were deeply attracted to
water and by being in it,

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they need for pain relief
was dramatically reduced.

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His experiences forced him to ask what the long-term
effects the birth environment could have on a child.

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It was a question answered by
his colleague Bertil Jacobson.

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He studied adolescents who
displayed traumatic behavior

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and compared their birth records with
those of their brothers and sisters.

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He was astonished by his findings.

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We took three kinds of individuals.
We took suicides of different kinds,

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violence suicides, and suicides from asphyxia,
that is hanging and rounding and so forth,

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and we took drug addicts. And we
then found a clear relationship

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between the type of physical

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or traumatic birth which the infant
had and the outcome later in life.

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Uh… And it\'s a particularly important

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that a drug given to the mother

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apparently increases the risk for the
offspring to become addicted to drugs.

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It\'s a matter of a risk
factor and what we found was

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that the risk… relative risk
of becoming a drug addict

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is plotted in here and here\'s
a number of doses of drugs

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administered to the mother during delivery,

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and when we have three doses given, the
risk is about five times as high as

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if you have not given any such drugs.

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The only explanation he could think of was the
phenomenon of imprinting known in the natural world,

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it is the process of bonding and explains

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how the young enough flock are able
to know exactly who their mother is.

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A birth, mother and young have a unique biochemistry
as both have high levels of pain killing opiates,

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hat presence during the sensitive period

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creates deeply rooted dependent behavior, but the
wrong stimulus can have terrible side effects.

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Jacobson believes that this is what
is happening in our hospitals.

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Imprinting in humans should be understood
as a feeling or some kind of satisfaction

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when the stimulus with which we were
imprinted at birth appears again,

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strangely enough is also
seems to be the case

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when a stimulus is painful or unpleasant.
This could then be one mechanism

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behind self-destructive behavior. While Jacobson
does not deny contributing social factors,

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it is a statistical fact that
social drug abuse began exactly

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one generation after the widespread
introduction of drugs during labor.

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(ph) We as a society had been sold

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on the idea that technology is…
is the answer to all problems

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and as I think we get more deeply admired in
the problems that technology is presented,

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we begin to realize that even in childbirth,
technology is not necessarily the answer.

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Dr. Michael Rosenthal(ph) was
influenced by Michel\'s ideas

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and established his birth centre
on the outskirts of Los Angeles.

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(ph) Birthing center was initially established to offer
alternatives to what had become a rather cumbersome

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and expensive and high-tech, uh…
birthing process in the local hospital.

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In talking with women who were patients
in my practice about the idea,

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I found that it seemed to have a lot of appeal and
talking with other physicians who didn\'t know.

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That\'s right, just let it come.

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Okay. Let me get it done.

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[sil.]

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Okay. Sorry guys, it is (inaudible).

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(ph) Unfortunately in this country,
Michel has been largely ignored.

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Among those physicians who have heard
of him discounted as being a foreigner

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or the originators with
other bizarre ideas.

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Michel\'s journey away from the medical
establishment began in Algeria in the late \'50s.

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Ironically, he had been
trained as a surgeon

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as one of the pillars of orthodox medicine.

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For his military service, he was sent
to the Berber town of (inaudible)

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during the Algerian civil war.

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His job was to operate on wounded
at both sides of the conflict.

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And this (inaudible) for the
place, well for the first time,

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I saw some women grapping the edge of
the bed and giving birth like that.

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I don\'t know for sure

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but I imagined that probably
this has been deeply imprinted

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in my memory and perhaps it
had an influence on the way

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after that in Pithiviers, we have been
changing our attitude to childbirth.

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Michel began to see birth

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not only in medical terms but in social terms,
how children are brought into the world

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and how they are raised is deeply attached
to the culture and values of any society.

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Today, in the mountain villages, the women no
longer give birth in the vertical position.

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Small maternity units have been built

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and Western medicine has done what the
guns of the French army failed to do,

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and with the relentless
march of Western values

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has come the breakdown of tribal culture.

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All over the world,

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women have always sung lullabies and
probably they were very important

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in the development of human beings and
also as a way to teach the mother tongue.

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But it seemed that every where

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people telling to forget the
lullabies, these traditions are lost.

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And even such a place, these young women

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cannot sing the lullabies
where grandmother can sing.

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Michel believes that all women

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have a profound need to
sing to their babies.

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The loss of lullabies reveals how distanced women have
become through the clinical approach to child birth.

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So what I can do is give
you the phone number

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f another Jewish mother in the (inaudible).

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While at Pithiviers, he organized singing
classes to put women in touch with their roots

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and he continues to do so since
moving to London eight years ago.

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[music]

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The groups have many benefits. Young
mothers are able to exchange experiences,

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singing is a good breathing
exercise for pregnant women

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and for the young child it stimulates the
inner ear creating a sense of rhythm.

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In Pithiviers, we used to meet with
pregnant women, young mothers,

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babies to sing together and
at the end of this session,

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very often we are watching in the halls

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and we became aware of the rhythm, which is
common to many lullabies, when to sleep,

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when see… when to see. And after
that as if it was natural,

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we used to dance and (inaudible)
who were as if it was normal

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we\'re just dancing the walls.

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[music]

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I think medicine has started to

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go in a wrong way during the 17th century.

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It\'s the time when the doctors

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entered the… the birthing room, we have
to recall that during the 16th century,

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birth was absolutely women business.

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We have to recall, for example, that in
humble Germany, during the 16th century,

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a doctor was called… called
them to death and burnt alive

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because it disguised himself
as a woman to see a birth.

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Michel doesn\'t believe that childbirth has
always been a complex between men and women.

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To him, the history of
childbirth reveals the extent

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that societies taken over private function.

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There are anecdotal stories that early women went away
from the tribe and gave birth by rivers and streams,

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but as people came to live in communities,

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birth moved to the home. It was usually
attended by the mother of the pregnant women

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and later women in the community
that became known as midwives.

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Their role was not only to deliver the baby
but to perform the rituals of the group.

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Midwives thus became
powerful members of society

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and their influence was resented
by the male-dominated church.

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During the middle ages, millions were persecuted as witches
and male doctors were encouraged to take their place.

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So the big turning point is in 17th century

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when the doctors introduced
their new tools,

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the forceps, so from the time,
modern technique started

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with its own priority. From that time,
the priority of (inaudible) has been

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to know a anytime what\'s happening,

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to control what\'s happening and
to be ready to do something.

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This attitude can help us to understand
everything starting at the 17th century.

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Why were the doctors put the women
on the back, you control better

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laboring woman if she\'s on the back,
that\'s why it became fashionable

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to consulted the birth in huge hospitals,

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you can\'t hold much better or this birth

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even that consulted in the same building. (ph)
The primary reason that women go to hospitals is

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because that\'s the only image they have today
of birth that… that\'s where birth occurs.

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Uh… They\'ve completely lost contact
with the historical context.

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Women… young women today are surprised to find out that
most, if not all of their grandparents were born at home,

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uh… and then births in this… even in this country
was attended primarily by midwives at the turn…

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turn of the century. And when I asked them to
go back to their families and make enquiries,

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umm… there\'s… Once again they\'re surprised when they find
out the sometimes even their parents were born at home.

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There\'s a tendency to think that birth
has always happened in hospitals.

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[music]

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So this is the house where I was born.
It used to be a nursery school

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and my mother was in charge
of this nursery school,

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so I was born here, then I
went to this nursery school,

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I was a pupil of my mother. And then,
I went to this other school for boys.

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These are the trees where we
used to climb with my brother.

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During my… the first 12 years of my
life, this was my whole universe.

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[non-English narration]

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Michel\'s mother is 98, the
oldest active poets in France

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and who still has a weekly radio program.

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During a home birth, 50 years ago,

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the man was somewhere in the house. He was
boiling water or doing something like.

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He was not really participating,
sharing the experience.

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So something happened suddenly
in the late \'50s, in the \'60s

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and we have to understand

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why suddenly most western women wanted
to be assisted by the baby\'s father.

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Probably the first reason is that
they have to give birth in a hospital

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and they felt the need to maintain

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to keep a link with their daily
life, and the only possible link

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were the baby\'s father because at the same time,
the family became smaller and smaller and smaller.

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It became the so-called nuclear
family, the only family or person

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in the life of many modern
women where the baby\'s father,

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and also is the time when the all
of the midwife became different

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and other midwife disappeared,
as in some countries

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or she became a member of a
medical team and this was new.

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The revolution in childbirth came in the \'50s. New
maternity units were parts of the massive health systems

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built by postwar governments.
The Baby Boomers thus became

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the first generation in history to
be born in hospitals attended by

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increasing numbers of medical
specialists and their tools.

00:23:45.000 --> 00:23:49.999
The aim was to produce healthier babies, it
was a policy driven by our faith in science

00:23:50.000 --> 00:23:54.999
and fueled by the efficiencies
that technology offered.

00:23:55.000 --> 00:23:59.999
In such an environment, the Caesarean
Section became more and more commonplace.

00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:04.999
It is a very painful one.

00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:09.999
[sil.]

00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:14.999
It is an emergency procedure developed to save the
5% of babies that become distressed during labor.

00:24:15.000 --> 00:24:19.999
However, today it is used to deliver
nearly a 5th of all western babies.

00:24:20.000 --> 00:24:24.999
A quarter of American babies, and
in Brazil the figure is 70%.

00:24:25.000 --> 00:24:29.999
I think there is an increasing awareness amongst
women that… with modern approaches to childbirth,

00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:34.999
they\'ve missed out on something. Okay, apparently
they\'ve got healthy babies at the end of the day,

00:24:35.000 --> 00:24:39.999
but then actually missed out
on something which is actually

00:24:40.000 --> 00:24:44.999
giving birth themselves. Doctors and
midwives don\'t give birth to babies,

00:24:45.000 --> 00:24:49.999
it\'s… it\'s the woman herself.
And I think there\'s a potential

00:24:50.000 --> 00:24:54.999
for personal growth and
transformation in women\'s personality

00:24:55.000 --> 00:24:59.999
through giving birth that culturally has been
completely ignored in… in western medicalized birth.

00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:04.999
As hospital birth became a
mass phenomenon at a time

00:25:05.000 --> 00:25:09.999
in western populations were growing
exponentially. New tools of industrial efficiency

00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:14.999
were developed to deal with the numbers. The
electronic fetal monitor became the most controversial

00:25:15.000 --> 00:25:19.999
and electrode is either placed on
or screwed into the baby\'s head

00:25:20.000 --> 00:25:24.999
to monitor its heartbeat. But
the woman is unable to move.

00:25:25.000 --> 00:25:29.999
Its rationale is to give immediate warning
danger but its critics say, it is an absolute

00:25:30.000 --> 00:25:34.999
subjugation of mother and child to
technology. Under constant observation,

00:25:35.000 --> 00:25:39.999
the woman becomes distressed
and complications develop.

00:25:40.000 --> 00:25:44.999
(ph) That\'s become very clear that the electronic fetal
monitor has created the problem it\'s looking for.

00:25:45.000 --> 00:25:49.999
There are now 10 studies are
comparing baby outcomes

00:25:50.000 --> 00:25:54.999
using electronic fetal monitoring that had been
done in this country Australia and England,

00:25:55.000 --> 00:25:59.999
and all have come to the same conclusion,
newborn outcomes are identical,

00:26:00.000 --> 00:26:04.999
whether use a monitor or use the more traditional
auscultation, but mother outcomes are different.

00:26:05.000 --> 00:26:09.999
In all of the studies, the incidences in Caesarean Section as two
to three times higher when the electronic fetal monitors used.

00:26:10.000 --> 00:26:14.999
Michel claims that technologies
have been introduced

00:26:15.000 --> 00:26:19.999
without proper assessment of their impact.

00:26:20.000 --> 00:26:24.999
People weren\'t born by Caesarean Section. Do
they have something in common when they\'re 50,

00:26:25.000 --> 00:26:29.999
you know, it\'s a simple question. Nobody can
also at the present time such a question

00:26:30.000 --> 00:26:34.999
or can you reach the age of 90

00:26:35.000 --> 00:26:39.999
or 100 years old without being breastfed.
Nobody can answer this… this question.

00:26:40.000 --> 00:26:44.999
The research center I have created

00:26:45.000 --> 00:26:49.999
has some objective which
are very different from

00:26:50.000 --> 00:26:54.999
the current medical research.
What we want to do is

00:26:55.000 --> 00:26:59.999
to study links between what happens
at the beginning of our life

00:27:00.000 --> 00:27:04.999
and what will happen later
on during our lifetime.

00:27:05.000 --> 00:27:09.999
When we talk about the beginning of life,

00:27:10.000 --> 00:27:14.999
I mean, the time we spending the war(ph).

00:27:15.000 --> 00:27:19.999
The period surrounding birth and the time
when were still a baby before being a child,

00:27:20.000 --> 00:27:24.999
it\'s what I call the primary period.

00:27:25.000 --> 00:27:29.999
[sil.]

00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:34.999
This question here concerns people who
have been breastfed more than a year

00:27:35.000 --> 00:27:39.999
and also they\'re have been
totally, totally breastfed

00:27:40.000 --> 00:27:44.999
during the first six months of their life.
Some of them have been immunized,

00:27:45.000 --> 00:27:49.999
other ones have not been immunized,

00:27:50.000 --> 00:27:54.999
vaccinated, and we compare, we study

00:27:55.000 --> 00:27:59.999
different criteria of good health.

00:28:00.000 --> 00:28:04.999
For Michel, breastfeeding is
more than a health issue,

00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:09.999
it is the very basis of the bonding
process. He says it should begin

00:28:10.000 --> 00:28:14.999
during the first hour of birth, while mother and
baby are still charged with the opiates of labor

00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:19.999
and the breast are full of
colostrum, the early milk.

00:28:20.000 --> 00:28:24.999
[music]

00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:29.999
But often the presence of
others prevents this occurring.

00:28:30.000 --> 00:28:34.999
He thus believes that a woman should have
complete privacy during the period of birth.

00:28:35.000 --> 00:28:39.999
The man doesn\'t need to be present, and the
midwives role is to listen from the distance.

00:28:40.000 --> 00:28:44.999
These conditions he says are also
the best a birth to take place.

00:28:45.000 --> 00:28:49.999
In such an environment, the woman
may enter a very primal inner world

00:28:50.000 --> 00:28:54.999
and her body\'s hormonal
triggers occur rapidly

00:28:55.000 --> 00:28:59.999
and instinctively creating a
speedy and uncomplicated birth.

00:29:00.000 --> 00:29:04.999
You know, what is it difficult is to show
with the camera, what this film is about,

00:29:05.000 --> 00:29:09.999
it\'s about privacy. And
the big mistakes made

00:29:10.000 --> 00:29:14.999
these last years by the
promoters of natural childbirth

00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:19.999
is that they have ignored
this need for privacy.

00:29:20.000 --> 00:29:24.999
They have overused world
suggesting that a woman

00:29:25.000 --> 00:29:29.999
has the power to give her by yourself.

00:29:30.000 --> 00:29:34.999
No, don\'t come in, don\'t come in.

00:29:35.000 --> 00:29:39.999
Pascal was born at home.
I was 38 at the time

00:29:40.000 --> 00:29:44.999
and the authorities didn\'t really want me to have
a home birth so I had to opt out of the hospital

00:29:45.000 --> 00:29:49.999
and signed all kinds of declarations saying
that they couldn\'t be held responsible,

00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:54.999
but I decided I was going to have a home
birth. The thing about having a baby, which…

00:29:55.000 --> 00:29:59.999
But women (inaudible) they don\'t often say this but because
it\'s a bit… sort of rude really, it\'s a bit (inaudible).

00:30:00.000 --> 00:30:04.999
The feeling is… is a little bit like going to the
toilet, you know, and the reason why you want privacy,

00:30:05.000 --> 00:30:09.999
you wouldn\'t want to go to the toilet with the
door open, you know, and it\'s the feeling

00:30:10.000 --> 00:30:14.999
that you want to be on your own. You know, it is
private function and you… you want to be on your own

00:30:15.000 --> 00:30:19.999
and you don\'t want people staring at you, you don\'t
want to be observed, looked at and (inaudible).

00:30:20.000 --> 00:30:24.999
[sil.]

00:30:25.000 --> 00:30:29.999
Michel was in the house
and around the place

00:30:30.000 --> 00:30:34.999
but he wasn\'t actually with me a
lot and I wanted to be on my own

00:30:35.000 --> 00:30:39.999
and I… I was on my own and I was
quite an inhibitor screaming.

00:30:40.000 --> 00:30:44.999
Just… not… it\'s not agony. I mean, I would
say it\'s just discomfort but more and more

00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:49.999
I was in hard labor and… and the midwife arrived
maybe three minutes before Pascal came out

00:30:50.000 --> 00:30:54.999
and… and we just had time to put something soft,
some kind of padding on the floor and out he came.

00:30:55.000 --> 00:30:59.999
There was a belief in the seven days

00:31:00.000 --> 00:31:04.999
that the man participating
through the birth might have

00:31:05.000 --> 00:31:09.999
a lot of long term positive effect,
stronger links inside the couple,

00:31:10.000 --> 00:31:14.999
stronger links with the baby.

00:31:15.000 --> 00:31:19.999
It seems that, it\'s not as simple as that.
And the rate of divorces has not decrease

00:31:20.000 --> 00:31:24.999
this last 20 years in the time when
the possible, the demand is almost

00:31:25.000 --> 00:31:29.999
a (inaudible) and because we talk
too much at the present time

00:31:30.000 --> 00:31:34.999
but the man participating to the birth.

00:31:35.000 --> 00:31:39.999
We forget another aspect of his
possible all which is to protect…

00:31:40.000 --> 00:31:44.999
to protect the privacy of
the mother giving birth.

00:31:45.000 --> 00:31:49.999
[sil.]

00:31:50.000 --> 00:31:54.999
All the mammals have a strategy

00:31:55.000 --> 00:31:59.999
to be in a state of privacy when giving
birth. For example, our cousins, the monkeys,

00:32:00.000 --> 00:32:04.999
they go to the edge of the forest. Some
other mammals were active during the night,

00:32:05.000 --> 00:32:09.999
for example, their huts, give
birth during the day over rivers.

00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:14.999
Mammals will active during the day like
horses, give birth during the night.

00:32:15.000 --> 00:32:19.999
The reason humans have
denied privacy, he says is

00:32:20.000 --> 00:32:24.999
because societies want to interfere with birth
in order to print its own values on the child.

00:32:25.000 --> 00:32:29.999
In the societies, where it was an advantage

00:32:30.000 --> 00:32:34.999
for the survival of the group to
make men as aggressive as possible,

00:32:35.000 --> 00:32:39.999
then they had some rituals, so
that the newborn baby will have

00:32:40.000 --> 00:32:44.999
no contact with their mother and
no contact with Mother Earth.

00:32:45.000 --> 00:32:50.000
The technique he says is to deny that colostrum has
any value and to keep the baby something else.

00:32:55.000 --> 00:32:59.999
Michel that studies childbirth in different
cultures, not to endorse traditional ways

00:33:00.000 --> 00:33:04.999
but to see what it reveals
about that society.

00:33:05.000 --> 00:33:09.999
What he says that the actions
of those surrounding the baby

00:33:10.000 --> 00:33:14.999
during the first hour of life,
reveals the values of that group.

00:33:15.000 --> 00:33:19.999
So here we are in a

00:33:20.000 --> 00:33:24.999
typical (inaudible) village
built at the top of a mountain.

00:33:25.000 --> 00:33:29.999
Probably built at the top of the mountain so that
it was easier in the past to fight the enemies.

00:33:30.000 --> 00:33:34.999
These people were warriors in the past.

00:33:35.000 --> 00:33:39.999
And I found that in most places,
why it was an advantage

00:33:40.000 --> 00:33:44.999
to develop the human
capacity to be aggressive.

00:33:45.000 --> 00:33:49.999
I found that almost always
they found some excuses,

00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:54.999
some rituals, some belief,
so that the first contact

00:33:55.000 --> 00:34:00.000
between mother and baby will be delayed
and especially, the first (inaudible).

00:34:40.000 --> 00:34:44.999
Another extreme case is the
case of the (inaudible),

00:34:45.000 --> 00:34:49.999
the Indian (inaudible), were also warriors,

00:34:50.000 --> 00:34:54.999
like these people. And when a baby
was born among the (inaudible),

00:34:55.000 --> 00:34:59.999
the mother was on a blanket,
the corners of the blankets

00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:04.999
were supported by four warriors so
that the mother was giving birth

00:35:05.000 --> 00:35:09.999
at a certain distance from the ground.

00:35:10.000 --> 00:35:14.999
The mother was giving birth in
such a position that it was easy

00:35:15.000 --> 00:35:19.999
to take the baby away from
the mother right away

00:35:20.000 --> 00:35:24.999
and also to be sure that newborn baby
will have no contact with Mother Earth.

00:35:25.000 --> 00:35:29.999
When we consider childbirth in
different cultures, it seems that

00:35:30.000 --> 00:35:34.999
the relationship with the mother, the first contact
with the mother and the relationship with Mother Earth

00:35:35.000 --> 00:35:39.999
they are of the same nature.

00:35:40.000 --> 00:35:48.000
[music]

00:36:20.000 --> 00:36:24.999
If childbirth is an
expression of our values

00:36:25.000 --> 00:36:29.999
then it was only appropriate that
Michel was invited to Moscow in 1992.

00:36:30.000 --> 00:36:34.999
He took his message that to rebuild
society, we must rebuild birth

00:36:35.000 --> 00:36:39.999
to a country thrown in turmoil into
it\'s enormously large problems,

00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:44.999
it offered some of the simple
solutions of Pithiviers.

00:36:45.000 --> 00:36:49.999
I just tell you what we did in a hospital,

00:36:50.000 --> 00:36:54.999
which is a state hospital. We just bought

00:36:55.000 --> 00:36:59.999
a second hand piano.

00:37:00.000 --> 00:37:04.999
We introduced the piano in the
small home like this one.

00:37:05.000 --> 00:37:09.999
And we invited the pregnant
women to come every Tuesday

00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:14.999
to sing together.

00:37:15.000 --> 00:37:19.999
And the pregnant women where happy to come…

00:37:20.000 --> 00:37:24.999
and happy to come back.

00:37:25.000 --> 00:37:29.999
So these are boxes, rooms. Every
women has her own separate room.

00:37:30.000 --> 00:37:34.999
Stepping into a Moscow maternity unit,

00:37:35.000 --> 00:37:39.999
is like stepping into the past.
Their separation ritual is feared

00:37:40.000 --> 00:37:44.999
that baby catching an infection.

00:37:45.000 --> 00:37:49.999
The newborns are best taken from their
mothers and placed under a heater.

00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:54.999
Meanwhile the women were (inaudible)
a bowl of soup in the corridor.

00:37:55.000 --> 00:37:59.999
However, it is not quite
as bad as it seems.

00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:04.999
Many women arrive in very poor states of
health from exhaustion or malnutrition.

00:38:05.000 --> 00:38:09.999
Even so, the statistics of
Russian births are very good.

00:38:10.000 --> 00:38:14.999
The Caesarean Section rate is 7%. There
is a very low mortality rate of babies

00:38:15.000 --> 00:38:19.999
and a virtually nonexistent
mortality rate for mothers.

00:38:20.000 --> 00:38:24.999
All of this is arrived at with
an extremely low use of drugs,

00:38:25.000 --> 00:38:29.999
indicative of the shortage of all medical supplies. So
the level of skill of the medical staff is very high.

00:38:30.000 --> 00:38:34.999
[non-English narration]

00:38:35.000 --> 00:38:39.999
This is rooms for postpartum.
Can… does she know… does…

00:38:40.000 --> 00:38:44.999
what is the prenatal mortality rate.
For these (inaudible)?

00:38:45.000 --> 00:38:49.999
For the hospital, yes, for the…

00:38:50.000 --> 00:38:54.999
Seven per thousand. Seven
per thousand, yes.

00:38:55.000 --> 00:38:59.999
You have very good outcome. When the future
of childbirth in Moscow is concerned,

00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:04.999
they have an opportunity to bypass

00:39:05.000 --> 00:39:09.999
the big mistakes we made in
the west this last 20 years.

00:39:10.000 --> 00:39:14.999
But at the same time, they
have already good statistics.

00:39:15.000 --> 00:39:19.999
The point is that they don\'t
change too much what (inaudible)

00:39:20.000 --> 00:39:24.999
positive in their attitude. They
have to be careful not to introduce

00:39:25.000 --> 00:39:29.999
some new gadgets toys,
electronic fetal monitoring,

00:39:30.000 --> 00:39:34.999
which will alter the environment, so they
have to be careful to bypass these mistakes.

00:39:35.000 --> 00:39:39.999
Sometimes I think that I am more
confident in the future of Moscow,

00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:44.999
that in the future of an American city.

00:39:45.000 --> 00:39:53.000
[non-English narration]

00:39:55.000 --> 00:39:59.999
He still believes however that hospital
birth is fraught with problems.

00:40:00.000 --> 00:40:04.999
The real solution he now promotes isn\'t a report
he wrote for the World Health Organization.

00:40:05.000 --> 00:40:13.000
It looks at the viability of organized home
birth and draws on the experience of Holland.

00:40:15.000 --> 00:40:19.999
[music]

00:40:20.000 --> 00:40:24.999
Holland is unique, and that it is the only western country
which resisted the wholesale adoption of hospital births.

00:40:25.000 --> 00:40:29.999
We met (inaudible) at the present time

00:40:30.000 --> 00:40:34.999
that Amsterdam

00:40:35.000 --> 00:40:39.999
is the biggest maternity unit in the world.
Thing that (inaudible)

00:40:40.000 --> 00:40:44.999
in the city is born at home.

00:40:45.000 --> 00:40:53.000
[music]

00:40:55.000 --> 00:40:59.999
A home birth has always been a very
normal part of the daily life in Holland,

00:41:00.000 --> 00:41:04.999
and the most important
reason for that is that

00:41:05.000 --> 00:41:09.999
the position of midwives
is… is a very strong one,

00:41:10.000 --> 00:41:14.999
and there is a very clear demarcation of
tasks between the midwives and nutritionist.

00:41:15.000 --> 00:41:19.999
The midwives deal is normal,
was the healthiness

00:41:20.000 --> 00:41:24.999
and the obstetricians detailed(ph)
illness and the complications.

00:41:25.000 --> 00:41:29.999
The power of the midwife in Holland is that

00:41:30.000 --> 00:41:34.999
she decides when to handle over woman to a doctor
and the doctors are dependent of the midwives.

00:41:35.000 --> 00:41:39.999
If a doctor in Amsterdam, for instance,

00:41:40.000 --> 00:41:44.999
is not working in a… in
a female friendly way

00:41:45.000 --> 00:41:49.999
and next time I… I will not refer to a pregnant woman
this doctor. I will refer to another obstetrician.

00:41:50.000 --> 00:41:54.999
In that sense, the power of
the midwives in Amsterdam

00:41:55.000 --> 00:41:59.999
is… is immense because they can
make a doctor without any work.

00:42:00.000 --> 00:42:04.999
The key to the Dutch system is that women

00:42:05.000 --> 00:42:09.999
visit a midwife, not a doctor
when they become pregnant.

00:42:10.000 --> 00:42:14.999
The midwife is qualified to assess the risk
factors that would inhibit home birth,

00:42:15.000 --> 00:42:19.999
past history blood pressure and so on. These
factors are an agreed set of criteria

00:42:20.000 --> 00:42:24.999
approved by body consisting
of health officials, doctors,

00:42:25.000 --> 00:42:29.999
midwives and insurance companies.
Through the screening process,

00:42:30.000 --> 00:42:34.999
complications during home births are
extremely rare, and in that event,

00:42:35.000 --> 00:42:39.999
a hospital to conduct an emergency
Caesarean is only 20 minutes away.

00:42:40.000 --> 00:42:44.999
[music]

00:42:45.000 --> 00:42:49.999
Upon qualification, midwives work in professional
practices, much like lawyers and doctors.

00:42:50.000 --> 00:42:54.999
Amsterdam\'s dotted with
these birth centers.

00:42:55.000 --> 00:42:59.999
(inaudible) practice includes a shop,
and the services extend to full

00:43:00.000 --> 00:43:04.999
prenatal and postnatal care,
so these practices become

00:43:05.000 --> 00:43:10.000
the focal point for birth in the community.

00:43:20.000 --> 00:43:24.999
Speaking about the difference between
home birth and… and hospital birth

00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:29.999
is when you as midwife are called in the middle
of the night, which you get never used to

00:43:30.000 --> 00:43:34.999
because it\'s awful to… to be
disturbed in the middle of the night

00:43:35.000 --> 00:43:39.999
when you\'re sleeping, but when you get up
and automatically you go into your car,

00:43:40.000 --> 00:43:44.999
you drive to the woman\'s house and there
is a great welcome to the midwife.

00:43:45.000 --> 00:43:49.999
You\'re very, very welcome, and as a woman in
pain. Yeah, you have no choice, you go there,

00:43:50.000 --> 00:43:54.999
and there the people are waiting
for this baby for nine months

00:43:55.000 --> 00:43:59.999
and you… you enter the center of the world and
you forget about anything because you really

00:44:00.000 --> 00:44:04.999
want them to have a very beautiful
experience and you see the wallpaper,

00:44:05.000 --> 00:44:09.999
you see the furniture, you see the
books and you really… then you feel,

00:44:10.000 --> 00:44:14.999
it\'s for them unique. And then it
becomes unique for the midwife.

00:44:15.000 --> 00:44:23.000
[music]

00:44:55.000 --> 00:44:59.999
To organize birth at home, it\'s considerably cheaper than
in hospital as beds and wards don\'t need to be built.

00:45:00.000 --> 00:45:04.999
But to make it realistic for women
to stay at home with the newborn,

00:45:05.000 --> 00:45:09.999
the Dutch system involves
sending emails to help out.

00:45:10.000 --> 00:45:14.999
So there are no many western
countries where they feel

00:45:15.000 --> 00:45:19.999
that the time has come to adopt home birth

00:45:20.000 --> 00:45:24.999
to our modern urbanized societies,
and to achieve this goal,

00:45:25.000 --> 00:45:29.999
we have some lessons to learn from Holland.

00:45:30.000 --> 00:45:34.999
And in particular, I think
it\'s important to look at the

00:45:35.000 --> 00:45:39.999
whole of a person who… who is
absolutely special to the Dutch system.

00:45:40.000 --> 00:45:44.999
She\'s the so-called help nurse.

00:45:45.000 --> 00:45:53.000
[non-English narration]

00:45:55.000 --> 00:45:59.999
When a woman had her delivery,

00:46:00.000 --> 00:46:04.999
she\'s very sensitive and… and tired

00:46:05.000 --> 00:46:09.999
and because of the blood (inaudible)
and that sort of things.

00:46:10.000 --> 00:46:14.999
And it\'s really nice for her, when she has someone
around the house who she can ask anything on.

00:46:15.000 --> 00:46:19.999
And I can say to the visitors… \"Well,
I think it\'s time for her to sleep.

00:46:20.000 --> 00:46:24.999
If you don\'t mind, please come in the
afternoon,\" because then they can be mad at me

00:46:25.000 --> 00:46:29.999
and that\'s not so bad for the… for the women because
their best friend to… to… to get rid of your best friend

00:46:30.000 --> 00:46:34.999
for… for an hour, it\'s not so… it\'s not so
good and for a maternity (inaudible) nurse,

00:46:35.000 --> 00:46:39.999
it\'s really easy. The help
nurse can stay at the home

00:46:40.000 --> 00:46:44.999
of the newborn baby several hours a day

00:46:45.000 --> 00:46:49.999
during the week following the birth.
And well, at home she can cook,

00:46:50.000 --> 00:46:54.999
and she can be cleaning the house,
shopping. She\'s a kind of substitute

00:46:55.000 --> 00:46:59.999
for the extended family, we\'re always to
recall that our societies are very especial,

00:47:00.000 --> 00:47:04.999
reduced to the nuclear
family and we have to adapt

00:47:05.000 --> 00:47:09.999
to this new situation.

00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:18.000
[music]

00:47:20.000 --> 00:47:24.999
Midwives in most Western countries are

00:47:25.000 --> 00:47:29.999
legally entitled to supervise births at
home. But the resistance, both in public

00:47:30.000 --> 00:47:34.999
and from health institutions is enormous
and those who choose home births

00:47:35.000 --> 00:47:39.999
are often judged irresponsible
or just play mad.

00:47:40.000 --> 00:47:44.999
When women go to their general practitioner, which is what
happens in this country to have their pregnancy confirmed,

00:47:45.000 --> 00:47:49.999
they\'re referred directly to a hospital and
that\'s the system and if a woman then says,

00:47:50.000 --> 00:47:54.999
\"Well, I\'d like to have my baby at home,\" it\'s sort
of everyone takes a step back and has to think or

00:47:55.000 --> 00:47:59.999
\"How do I do this now?\" It\'s probably
because hospital birth is institutionalized

00:48:00.000 --> 00:48:04.999
and general practitioners at this moment in time
are not aware that home birth is a safe option.

00:48:05.000 --> 00:48:09.999
Well, see, they became medical students when they
were 18 and they\'ve been tells us the age of 18,

00:48:10.000 --> 00:48:14.999
which is a very impressionable age that childbirth
is hazardous and dangerous and babies die

00:48:15.000 --> 00:48:19.999
and women die and everybody dies. I mean,
there is a grain of truth in that,

00:48:20.000 --> 00:48:24.999
it\'s not ever holy say,
there are risks in birth

00:48:25.000 --> 00:48:29.999
but that whole philosophy is so,

00:48:30.000 --> 00:48:34.999
and of course, there\'s a…
there\'s a huge investment

00:48:35.000 --> 00:48:39.999
in hospital birth and
medicalize birth as investment

00:48:40.000 --> 00:48:44.999
by obstetricians themselves because you don\'t need
obstetricians and less birth actually becomes abnormal.

00:48:45.000 --> 00:48:49.999
There\'s a huge investment by
all the equipment makers,

00:48:50.000 --> 00:48:54.999
uh… the equipment makers of intravenous
infusions, fetal monitoring equipment

00:48:55.000 --> 00:48:59.999
is an enormous financial
implication in medicalized birth.

00:49:00.000 --> 00:49:04.999
Holland is the only country in the world

00:49:05.000 --> 00:49:09.999
that has reliable statistics
on organized home births.

00:49:10.000 --> 00:49:14.999
The details of (inaudible) Dale daughter
are being added to annual statistics

00:49:15.000 --> 00:49:19.999
which give rates complicational mortality
is equal or lower than anywhere in Europe.

00:49:20.000 --> 00:49:24.999
But it is achieved with significantly
lowest caesarean rates

00:49:25.000 --> 00:49:29.999
or drug use and at a vastly
reduced cost to society.

00:49:30.000 --> 00:49:34.999
[sil.]

00:49:35.000 --> 00:49:39.999
Thanks to the Dutch mother,
we can say for sure

00:49:40.000 --> 00:49:44.999
that that is at the present time,
there is no evidence suggesting

00:49:45.000 --> 00:49:49.999
that that is any kind of
damage which is associated

00:49:50.000 --> 00:49:54.999
with the development of home
birth on the… on the contrary.

00:49:55.000 --> 00:49:59.999
When we consider childbirth at the
present time, we have to recall that

00:50:00.000 --> 00:50:04.999
that is the Netherland on the one hand and
the rest of the world on the other hand.

00:50:05.000 --> 00:50:13.000
[music]

00:50:20.000 --> 00:50:24.999
This is the place where people hate trees.

00:50:25.000 --> 00:50:29.999
In a sense, we might say we have
a negative attitude to life

00:50:30.000 --> 00:50:34.999
and that is something what\'s a
little ironic that it\'s precisely

00:50:35.000 --> 00:50:39.999
in such a place that I started to wonder

00:50:40.000 --> 00:50:44.999
about the roots of a positive attitude
to life, and I understood that probably

00:50:45.000 --> 00:50:49.999
there is a link between the
respect for Mother Earth

00:50:50.000 --> 00:50:54.999
and the relationship
between mother and child.

00:50:55.000 --> 00:50:59.999
And it\'s how in the hospital
of this small town,

00:51:00.000 --> 00:51:04.999
we started to disturb as little as possible,
the first contact between mother and baby.

00:51:05.000 --> 00:51:09.999
We had the time of the… of
the history of mankind,

00:51:10.000 --> 00:51:14.999
when the question is not anymore how
to stop… stop destroying the planet.

00:51:15.000 --> 00:51:19.999
Yeah, this is a good place to see how
man turns to destroy the planet.

00:51:20.000 --> 00:51:24.999
The real question now is what kind of man

00:51:25.000 --> 00:51:29.999
will be able to stop destroying the planet.

00:51:30.000 --> 00:51:38.000
[music]

00:52:30.000 --> 00:52:35.000
One thing that I will always remember that
was (inaudible) placed and she gave birth.

00:52:45.000 --> 00:52:50.000
[sil.]