Eliza there are three really important sections in that article.
This is the first.
Inevitably this difference in experience manifests itself in an ongoing debate on how best to manage childbirth. Midwife groups advocate normal delivery and "natural" births while obstetricians tend to see medical intervention as a benefit rather than a bane. Yesterday, the healthcare commission published a report highlighting several key problems in Britain's maternity services, one of which was an inherent tension between midwives and doctors on maternity wards. Caught up in the middle are the mothers.
This is the second.
A recent study also found a huge polarity between pregnant women's expectations of birth and the reality. Expectant mothers need not be frightened by rare, unlikely risks, but they should be given realistic information about the pain and unpredictability of childbirth.
Instead there exists a misguided, competitive birth culture; where "lucky" or natural "birthers" are praised for their success, while mothers who "succumb" to medical intervention openly admit they've "failed". Elective caesarean births are so low on the league table they can barely be mentioned without fear of acrimony.
This is the third.
Natural or not, she says, the "major, major concern" of obstetricians and medics is delivering mothers and babies safely, without judgment and by whichever means. Everything else is secondary - luxurious thinking afforded by the medical advances women are now encouraged to shun. After all, "why do we have children?" asks Sher. "It's not for our own gratification, for our childbirth experience, it's because we want to have a child."
The rest of it is interesting and important... but I think the other bits in the article tend to overshadow the above.