Re some statistics, I found these on a website supporting India women in the right for safe motherhood. I have seen similar statistcs elsewhere and have no reason to doubt them.
Please realise that these are statistic for women who have a range of other problems rising out of ther poverty and I am not saying these statistics would be the same in the UK if we all went for non-medical delivery. But the stats do support that large numbers of deaths do occur cause by conditions that have nothing to do with poor nutrition, and everything to do with not having a trained birth attendent and access to furter help eg blood transfusions.
'Every minute, one woman somewhere in the world dies from a complication related to pregnancy or childbirth. This is almost 600,000 women a year, worldwide. Ninety-nine percent of these deaths occur in developing countries (1,2). In India, one woman dies every five minutes from a pregnancy-related cause.
For every three deaths of women in their reproductive years in some developing countries, one is the result of complications from pregnancy and childbirth.15 percent of deaths of women in the reproductive age in India are maternal deaths.
Complications related to pregnancy, childbirth and complications arising out of unsafe abortion are leading causes of death in adolescent girls (3). In India, 50 percent of maternal deaths of girls in the 15-19 years age group are due to unsafe complications arising out of unsafe abortion(7).
The underlying causes for maternal mortality are poor health and nutrition, lack of physical access to healthcare (including transportation and finances), medical causes and socio cultural factors that obstruct and underplay the importance of healthcare for women.
These contribute to the Four Delays:
Delay in identifying a complication; delay in making a decision to seek treatment; delay in getting the woman to the healthcare center; delay in receiving quality treatment.(3)
Over 80 percent of maternal deaths in India, as elsewhere in the world, are due to six medical causes: hemorrhage, eclampsia, obstructed labor, sepsis, complications arising due to unsafe abortion and pre-existing conditions such as anemia and malaria. All of these can be treated in a hospital or First Referral Unit that has emergency facilities for obstetric care and skilled medical personnel.(6)'
I have not posted the whole article, those who are interested go to www.whiteribbonalliance-india.org/factsandfigures.htm
And I do recognise that child birth for women in the developed world is not the same. I fully accept that many women have low intervention/no intervention deliveries. But for those of us that develop compications, or have a dangerous presentation (ds was a very large footling breach) all the positive thinking in the world wouldn't have mattered. Some of us need intervention and this is part of the reason for the difference between developed and developing country statistics. To deny this is to deny reality.