“In the Netherlands, home birth is an ordinary choice,” according to Franka Cadée, Dutch midwife

In your country, one in eight women give birth at home. How to explain it?

In the Netherlands, home birth is a mainstream choice, not an alternative method. In our mentality, pregnancy is not synonymous with illness and we do not consider childbirth to be particularly risky. If a woman experiences complications, we transfer her to the hospital in less than half an hour, because we have a dense health network.

But our society also has a better acceptance of pain. It is part of life and we experience it better if we are at home, in our familiar environment.

The epidural rate is only 24%. How do you explain it?

The Dutch government itself encourages women to give birth at home when they can, and the hospital is seen more as a safety belt in case of complications. Dutch midwives, on the other hand, are autonomous and highly respected.

Couples expecting a child can consult a midwife directly, without going through a gynecologist. We also, for the most part, work privately and not in hospitals, so we are independent medical practitioners.

Our training includes all situations, from highly medicalized childbirth to home birth. And at the hospital, obstetricians are less interventionist than in France, so that the natural process of childbirth takes its course.

However, the rate of home births is falling…

In fact, around 30% of women used it fifteen years ago, there are only around 15% today. The medical profession has become more suspicious over time.