Reagan Appointee Dismisses Charges Against Marianne Doshi

In San Luis Obispo County, California, law and order Judge Richard C. Kirkpatrick, a Ronald Reagan appointee; in a surprise move dismissed charges against Marianne Doshi, 31, who was indicted on two felony counts: second degree nurder, and practicing medicine without a license. The charges stemmed from the death of a child born. at home to Christine and Robert Gannage, at which birth Doshi acted as the midwife. (See WSW, October 1978) The medical profession completely

Midwife Marianne Doshi

refuses to allow parents to make the choice of having a baby at home," Kirkpatrick later said in a newspaper interview.

Dr. John Mahnke, Chairman of the Ob-Gyn Department at San Luis Obispo County Hospital, the physician who first brought the Doshi case to the attention of authorities, said of Kirkpatrick's ruling, "I'm disappointed. I think a crime was committed and I think it should have gone to a trial to at least evaluate it."

Robert Gannage had been "whisked away by some doctor (Mahnke) who pumped me about the birth and then told me the story was a possible felony conviction. I talked to him because I thought he needed information to help the baby. But he took

advantage of me. He didn't care about the baby or me or my wife; his attitude was Ah Hah! I finally got one!''

Doshi believes that her arrest is part of a general campaign against home birth and lay midwifery. "My arrest is not solely aimed at me, but is an attempt to intimidate parents who might choose to deliver children at home. Babies die in hospital delivery rooms and babies die at home. situations sadden me."'

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Dr. Tom Elmendorf of the California Medical Association, which recently succeeded in hopelessly diluting a bill proposed by the state's lay midwives, which would have provided for the training and licensing of lay midwives, stated that "we feel we have greatly improved infant mortality statistics in California. And we feel that a movement that would take birth out of a technological environment would seriously threaten those statistics." Dr. Elmendorf could not produce any actual statistics showing the high risk of home birth.

Susan Troll, of the California Association of Midwives, points out that "A birth can cost from $800 to $2,000. That's a lot of money doctors are losing to home birth." Mimi Ingraham, Deputy Chief of Consumer Services in the State Department of Consumer Affairs, says, "the doctors haven't come up with any legitimate arguments or statistics against home birth. Their fears are strictly

economic."'

Home birth advocate Dr. Milton Estes claims that his four-year-long study of northern California home births establishes that "planned home deliveries are no more dangerous than hospital births. At home, people feel in control of the process. In the hospital, they fear they won't be. They're afraid they won't be free to move around, they fear separation from the infant and needless procedures such as routine intravenous, routine fetal monitor, breaking of water, induced labor. But these are the negative reasons. For a lot of people, it just feels right to have a baby in the intimacy of their own home. Birth is not just a medical process, it is one of the penultimate experiences of life."

Information from Seven Days and Los Angeles Times

IT'S IN THE REGULATIONS

The Association for Childbirth at Home, International (ACHI) has long been aware of the general issue of rights of persons in the military and the fact that U.S. military hospitals have abysmal maternity care. But nowhere have the issues come to such a head as with Airman First Class Amanda Hess. Airman Hess is an ACHI student and medical supply clerk at an Air Force Hospital in California. She was confined to a hospital on her due date by an Air Force Captain. The reason given to her was "pitting edema". Amanda had a normal urine specimen and normal blood pressure. The Captain knew of Amanda's plans to have a home birth. After being hospitalized all day (Amanda was on leave from her supply job), she requested to go home, feeling she would rest better there. When she could not get the Captain's permission, she signed herself out. A few hours later Amanda's husband, also on active duty with the Air Force, was contacted and told Amanda was AWOL from the hospital.

The following morning an Air Force colonel who is an MD and the second highest officer on the base told Amanda that "since you are [on] active duty the Air Force has the right to decide what medical care you receive. Either you will be admitted to the hospital or be at work full time...The Air Force does not allow home births now." Amanda asked, "Then

you are saying that if I decide to have my baby at home I could be courtmartialed?" The colonel said, "Yes, because you would be going against an Air Force decision. Do you understand that you cannot make your own medical decisions when you are on active duty?" Airman Hess said she understood. She was also told that convalescence leave would not be granted if she had her baby at home because they could not verify the birth.

Airman Hess contacted the ACHI national office for help in early April. ACHI documented higher drugged births and complications in several military hospitals, and also found an Air Force Regulation which does in fact allow active duty Air Force women to have their babies at home. Amanda gave birth to a nine pound one ounce infant daughter at home on April 15, 1978.

If you have documentation of obstetrical difficulties in the military, ACHI would like to have a copy. Write to their Field Research Team member who is doing a study on "Obstetrical Practices in the U.S. Military Hospitals''. Contact Sharon Bulger, "Military Obstetrical Study," c/o Box 1219, Cerritos, California 90701.

Information excerpted from Birth Notes

Vol. II, No. 1, 1978

BITS & Pieces

(Her Say)--The Parliament of India's Hyderabad district is debating whether to export women to Arabia. Road Mistry, a minister in the district "Parliament, recently proposed to unload Hydera. bad's excess women on the Arabs.

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Mistry told the Parliament that women whose parents can't afford dowries would be much better off as second wives to men in the oil-rich Gulf states. She says she herself had travelled in Arabia and met Indian women there who were "unusually dutiful and happy". Some lucky daughters, Mistry adds, even bring TV's home to their parents.

The Hyderabad opposition party, however, be lieves the women might be better off staying single. One opposition leader charged that women exported to Arab countries would most likely end up as slaves or prostitutes.

(Her Say)--Six longtime women employees of the Del Monte Corporation in California have accused that company of sex discrimination in a class action suit filed in U.S. District Court. The women also contend that their bargaining agent, the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union, failed to defend them effectively against the bias.

The women employees charge that Del Monte's male fruit sorters are encouraged to transfer to another plant whenever one plant is temporarily shut down during non-harvesting seasons. The suit claims that women sorters are denied this opportun ity. Also, the women charge that people "'off the street" are hired at lower wages by Del Monte, instead of the company relying on its stock of female employees who are laid off in the off seasons.

(Her Say)--In late October, President Carter signed a bill to protect the privacy of rape victims in Federal Court proceedings. The bill restricts testimony on previous sexual behavior of rape victims to statements that are genuinely relevant to the defense. It also prevents making the victim's private life the issue in the trial.

Carter said the bill provides a model for state and local revision of criminal and case law as it pertains to rape.

(Her Say)--Three women in Rochester, New York have been convicted of third degree criminal mischief for destroying a poster and breaking a glass in front of a theater where the movie "Snuff" was being shown. The movie graphically depicts the dismemberment and killing of a woman on screen.

Judge Charles Maloy sentenced the three women to pay the owner of the theater $100 each for damaging the moviehouse's property.

The Rochester chapter of Women Against Violence Against Women had attacked the movie "Snuff," saying it is a "graphic expression of a culture that terrorizes women in films, through rape, battering and other forms of physical and psychic violence."

dhe feminist funnies by alasir

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(Her Say)--The Hite Report, Brazil's number one best seller for the past few months, has been pulled from the bookstore shelves in that country.

Hite's book on the female sexual response is the only one of the top best sellers in Brazil to be authored by a woman. Thirty thousand copies of it had been sold there before it was censored.

The official government censor in Brazil said he banned the book because he believes the book to be "against the morals and good customs of Brazil". Shere Hite, author of the book, told Majority Report newspaper in New York that she believes it "is also a break with Brazilian customs for a woman to have an orgasm".

December, 1978/What She Wants/Pige 11