A record number of ordinary women are choosing unnecessary caesarean births simply because they are afraid of the pain of childbirth.
Louise Silverton of the Royal College of Midwives, says today's painkiller culture, where pills are routinely used to ease away everyday aches and pains, has led to an 'unacceptably high' level of C-sections, with one in four women opting for surgery.
Mrs Silverton, who has been a midwife for 30 years, said: 'Society's tolerance of pain and illness has reduced significantly. Women are less tolerant of labour pains because they haven't developed a tolerance of pain. For example, if they get period pain, they will take ibuprofen or go to their GP. Women are trying to remove the symptoms of pregnancy.'
Warning of the risks of the operation undergone by 170,000 women a year, she said: 'A caesarean is major abdominal surgery. I don't think women realise that. They see it as just another way of giving birth. They see it as easy.'
Although some C- sections are unavoidable for medical reasons, studies show that babies delivered surgically are more than twice as likely to die in their first month as those born naturally.
In an interview with The Observer, Mrs Silverton, who wants Britain's C-section rate to be closer to the 15 per cent recommended by the World Health Organisation, also blamed the medical profession for the record levels.
She claimed doctors were carrying out the operation too readily because of fear of litigation if a natural birth goes wrong.
In other cases, she said, doctors perform caesareans in the evening simply to ensure their night's sleep is not disturbed by a problem birth.
Consultant obstetrician Dr Maggie Blott, of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, disputed the claims, saying caesareans could be life-saving and the number of women having them for non-medical reasons was 'tiny'.
October 2008 | 
Baby Virus Warning
