To amplify your last statement, I recently had a kid. It was a low-risk pregnancy and in the end a fast and boring birth -- could have had the kid in a clean ba

To amplify your last statement, I recently had a kid. It was a low-risk pregnancy and in the end a fast and boring birth -- could have had the kid in a clean barn with some qualified attendants, in the end. But to get this boring, normalish (breech) birth I had to spend some hours researching providers and my insurance options to work with someone who practices low-intervention, evidence-based medicine -- and I had to drive to another state to work with this guy. Everyone within 40 miles wanted to throw a lot of resources and a C-section at me -- for no mortality or morbidity benefit that persists after about 10 minutes. (Breech babies born the old-fashioned way generally have low 1-minute Apgar scores.) I saved my insurance company a ton of money, I have to say. The whole experience of pregnancy was an experience of reading the medical literature and then trying to evade the "care" of obstetricians in the standard US care model. I'm glad we have the facilities to deal with all the complications that arise, but we don't have to use them just because they're there when they're not appropriate care.