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There is a pleasingly low return for the year 1935,
but again we must take a period of years to get a true
aspect of this distressing cause of death, which is to-day
attracting so much public attention.
We realise that the maternity services in this country
are disjointed. We have a state service, a voluntary service
and a private service, with a certain amount of interrelationship,
but each with its own function, its own views,
and its own procedure in the prevention of maternal
morbidity and mortality. It can be said that these have
failed separately, and we must ask what prospect there is
of a unified maternity service bringing the desired
reduction in the maternal death rate. The establishment
of a state midwifery service as indicated in the Midwives
Bill which is at the present time before Parliament is
obviously a step in the right direction, so that midwives
will function much in the same way as health visitors do
to-day. There is a growing feeling of insecurity in
pregnancy, the fear that things will go wrong, a fear of
pregnancy, and the consequent increase of birth control,
of abortions and miscarriages, It must be accepted that
this fear is a real factor in the cause of maternal mortality,
for psychology teaches us that fear can produce the thing
that is feared. Gradually maternity practice is departing
from the home; more and more cases are being admitted
to hospital and nursing home, and the normal pregnancy
and confinement is being treated as a pathological
condition. We must get back to normality on this
question.
III.—MATERNITY AND CHILD WELFARE.
The Maternity and Child Welfare services consist of
the following:—