On demand C-sections for all — not just the ‘too posh to push’

PREGNANT women in Britain, where the government provides free healthcare, may soon be able to get a caesarean on demand thanks to a rule change that critics describe as the health system caving into the “too posh to push” contingent.

Currently, British women who can’t afford to pay private doctors for their baby’s delivery have been allowed to have planned C-sections only if there are health concerns for mother or baby. Emergency C-sections are done when the situation demands it.

But new guidelines set to take effect later this month say pregnant women “with no identifiable reason” should be allowed a caesarean if they still want it following a discussion with mental health experts.

“It’s about time women who have no desire to view labour as a rite of passage into motherhood be able to choose how they want to have their baby,” said Pauline Hull, who has had two children by C-section because of medical reasons. “The important thing to me was meeting my baby, not the experience of labour.”

Hull runs the website ElectiveCesarean.com from her home in Surrey, south of London. She said midwives tend to overexaggerate the risks of C-sections and underestimate those of vaginal births.

The new draft guidelines come from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, or NICE. The agency’s guidelines are usually accepted by the government and determine what will be paid for by its health system. “In general, a C-section is a safe operation especially when performed as a planned procedure,” the new guidance says.