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Friday, August 11th, 2023

Hospitals Shutter Maternity Wards Amid Falling Birthrates

Author:     Melanie Evans
Source:     Wall Street Journal
Publication Date:     Aug. 10, 2023 | 8:00 am ET
 Link: Hospitals Shutter Maternity Wards Amid Falling Birthrates
Stephan:  

The United States already has the worst maternal mortality in the developed world. It is another way women are made second class in America. And mother baby healthcare is getting worse every year. The Wall Street Journal won’t say it, of course, but much of what they describe is due to Republican governance. Red states, particularly in rural areas, are becoming medical deserts for maternal healthcare, and it is reaching a point where a woman will have to go to a Blue state to deliver her baby.

More hospitals are getting out of the baby business.

Last month, Ohio-based University Hospitals said it would halt maternity services in the city of Ashland. OSF HealthCare said its hospital in Pontiac, Ill., would do so in September. Trinity Health plans to stop delivering babies in Troy, N.Y., and Baker City, Ore.

Megan Nelson, an emergency-room nurse for Trinity Health’s St. Alphonsus Medical Center in Baker City, has never delivered a baby. She will soon be responsible for women who arrive in labor and can’t get to the nearest hospital with maternity services, a 45-minute drive away. 

“It’s a scary prospect,” said Nelson, a member of the Oregon Nurses Association.

The closures are broadening a swath of America without maternity units, commonly communities that are sparsely populated or aging. The trend threatens to worsen infant health and maternal death rates that have hit the highest level in decades. 

Hospitals that are closing maternity units said they can’t recruit enough staff to safely operate. Hospitals with fewer births are less attractive to doctors and nurses, executives said. Births at OSF HealthCare St. James-John […]

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