robot-heart-politics:

notthatkindagay:sds:

Thousands of women are having to give birth outside maternity wards because of a lack of midwives and hospital beds.

The lives of mothers and babies are being put at risk as births in locations ranging from lifts to toilets - even a caravan - went up 15 per cent last year to almost 4,000.

Health chiefs admit a lack of maternity beds is partly to blame for the crisis, with hundreds of women in labour being turned away from hospitals because they are full.

Mail Online

And yet, despite birthing babies in corridors with a shortage of midwives, the UK still has a lower infant mortality rate. Incredible.

I suspect this would amount to less than 1% of all births. It’s also important to note that some of these are births in transit to the hospital and births in the hospital, but, gasp, not in the maternity ward. Yeah, real house of horrors over there.