Dodd introduces maternity care proposal
SACRAMENTO >> State Sen. Bill Dodd, D-Napa, and Assemblymember Autumn Burke, DInglewood, announced legislation this week to improve access to highquality maternity care in California, according to a news release from Dodd’s office.
The proposal, sponsored by the California NurseMidwives Association and Black Women for Wellness, also would curb disparities in outcomes for black women and infants and counter the obstetrician shortage — projected to be critical in some counties by 2025.
“California is the fifthlargest economy in the world, and no woman in our state should go without top-notch maternity care,” Dodd said in the same release. “By increasing access to nurse-midwives, we can improve outcomes for mothers and babies, especially those in rural or inner-city settings. The disparity in outcomes for women of color is absolutely unacceptable and my bill will help address that disparity.”
Senate Bill 1237 would expand access to care by authorizing nurse-midwives to conduct routine services without direct physician supervision, following the lead of 46 other states. California’s current model has not been shown to increase the safety or quality of maternity care.
States that allow autonomous practice within a more integrated, collaborative model between physicians and midwives show significantly lower rates of cesarean, preterm birth, low birth-weight infants and neonatal death. Nursemidwives perform 50,000 births a year in California, and Dodd’s bill will result in more women gaining access.
“Women in California deserve high quality care and the choices in childbirth that nurse-midwives offer,” said Kathleen Belzer, CNMA president, in the same release. “It is time to remove unnecessary requirements that simply create barriers. The data is clear that the status quo is not serving the lives of women and infants.”
Despite significantly reducing the maternal mortality rate in California, experts from the California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative report that black women in California still die at a rate that is 3-4 times higher than white women during pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum.
Furthermore, babies born to black women were more than three times as likely to die of a preterm, birth-related issue as babies born to white women in 2017. National and international organizations including the March of Dimes and the World Health Organization have stated that improved access to midwives is one of the necessary and innovative strategies to reduce and eventually eliminate racial disparities in maternal and infant outcomes.
Dodd represents California’s 3rd State Senate district, which includes the cities of Vallejo, Benicia, Fairfield, Napa, Dixon, Davis, American Canyon, Rio Vista, and Vacaville, among others.