Black Women Dying at the Hands of White Doctors While Giving Birth

Black Women Dying at the Hands of White Doctors While Giving Birth

Da’Jae Miller

13 April 2022

Rhetoric & Composition

Ms.McCray

Black Women Dying at the Hands of White Doctors While Giving Birth

• Davis, Dána-Ain. “Obstetric racism: the racial politics of pregnancy, labor, and ” Medical Anthropology 38.7 (2019): 560-573.

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                The author analyzes various birth stories in the article, as told by black native women in the United States. In the stories that the author analyzes, the women narrated the kind of racism they encountered while being attended to by the healthcare practitioners during labor and delivery. The article focuses on obstetric violence and racism against black women as a threat to birth outcomes. In one of the stories, as narrated by Josie, one of the nursing staff in a birthing facility, the author analyzes the case of Mitchelle, a black woman, being injected with Pitocin, an artificial hormone to induce contractions (P2). The nurse, Josie’s colleague, who injected Mitchelle with Pitocin, claimed that her cervix was open by 5 centimeters. Still, in the real sense, according to another Josie (the narrator), Mitchelle’s cervix was open close to 8 centimeters, which according to the midwife, training could not have required the injection of an artificial hormone (P2). The author argues that, by inducing Mitchelle’s contractions, the nursing staff denied Mitchelle a normal birthing experience that other clients get. Black Women Dying at the Hands of White Doctors While Giving Birth

Additionally, Mitchelle was only allowed to enter the labor room with only one person, unlike the white woman who had given birth in the same facility and was allowed to enter the room with six people. Josie argues that Mitchelle was discriminated against further when she was told not to push, even though she had the urge to do so. The doctors claimed that Mitchelle had a cord prolapse (A scenario whereby the umbilical cord is descended and the baby’s head is high in the birth canal). However, the narrator of this experience, Josie, a nursing staff, argues that claims made by doctors could not be true because Mitchelle’s water had not broken; therefore, it could be very unlikely that she had a cord prolapse. The author argues that Mitchelle was just one of the Black women undergoing a very adverse birth experience. Conclusively, the author argues that obstetric racism haunts black women’s experience in pregnancies, labor, and birth.

• Villarosa, Linda. “Why America’s black mothers and babies are in a life-or-death crisis.” The New York Times Magazine 11 (2018).

The author argues that the black infant mortality, death, and near-death encounters by black mothers are still a crisis in the United States (P6). The rate of maternal mortality is worse than it was two decades ago. However, the author argues that, according to the current CDC reports, the maternal mortality rate among black women is three times more likely to die from pregnancy-related complications than of white counterparts (P6). The author attributes the difference in maternal mortality rates between black women and white women to the existing racial disparities. The author argues that the states have put little attention to the gaps in maternal mortality rates, with few states reviewing pregnancy-related deaths (P6).

Additionally, the author argues that black women are at the receiving of maternal dates due to systemic racism, which subjects them to psychosocial stress, one of the leading causes of pregnancy-related complications like hypertension (P7). Equally, the author argues that societal racism, predominantly racial discrimination that black women experience in the healthcare systems, like dismissing genuine symptoms and concerns, contributes to poor birth outcomes among black women (P7). Additionally, the author suggests that it is the people’s responsibility to discuss structural racism, which threatens black women’s lives.

Works Cited

Davis, Dána-Ain. “Obstetric racism: the racial politics of pregnancy, labor, and    birthing.” Medical Anthropology 38.7 (2019): 560-573.                 https://doi.org/10.1080/01459740.2018.1549389

Villarosa, Linda. “Why America’s black mothers and babies are in a life-or-death crisis.” The New York Times Magazine 11 (2018). (pdf)