The Elizabeth Seton Birthing Center, the first free-standing birth center in the USA, is being forced to close after almost 30 years of service. Malpractice insurance premiums have soared to unprecendented levels leaving the center with no option but to close its doors.This is a disaster for the thousands of families who have relied on the center for vital healthcare options and community services.

With less than one month from notification from the insurance carrier, ESbC will close leaving pregnant women in flux and panic as some (due late August/early September) are forced to scramble to find care; the carrier should be vilified for not enabling the center to at least gradually reduce its client base without a crisis over their heads.

The closure of ESbC is part of a national crisis in healthcare which is hurting OB practice nationwide; ESCbC is just one more example of the big insurance industry taking away options to women; in this case if a center with 60-70% insured or self-pay client base can't remain open in Manhattan then consider a center in the rural south (for example) where the number
of Medicaid clients is in the majority; this signals a dangerous move away from safe care options for many women everywhere.

The closure of Manhattan's only free-standing birthing center takes away an important birth option for women in New York City, where 11% choose to have a midwife delivery. Aside from being an attack on women's health options and their control over their bodies, ESCbC is a center; even if the free-standing child birthing option were to stop (thus eliminating the only viable such location in the City) so too will close all other services, classes, support groups, well-care, preventative care, etc. for the entire population of pregnant and non-pregnant clients and their families, partners, infants, etc.

What is needed is intervention so that a bandaid (extended coverage, even for a few months) can be applied so the center stays open while it a) looks for viable long-term options or b) decides to close but humanely and gradually so that no individual's care is compromised.

In the immediate short-term, we need funds to provide this extended coverage, and in the long-term, a federal review and action to support women's health options and OB care in all its forms.

For more information please contact: Elizabeth Davis at 718 330 0034 or Benita Matofska at 917 501 6659 or click here.