Yes, I think it could happen to anyone...and is more likely to happen in certain places although I don't believe there is any place where hb fams and mws are truly 'safe' (licensing or not). There is a war being made by the AMA & ACOG against choice and especially homebirth...and Illinois is one state where battles have been brought to families and midwives most determinedly, for a very long time. This represents a stepping-up of their war, to be sure--since the parents brought a healthy baby to the hospital after a successful birth. This should have been considered the 'right thing to do--taking due precaution to seek medical assessment when in doubt'. Instead, it was only seen as an opportunity to make war.
It's a turf war and nothing else--AMA and ACOG are desperately trying to keep the power they have in people's lives, the political influence with the profit that comes along with that. And they do not care what the collateral damage is! Theirs is mainly a war of terrorism, striking (in keeping with the very definition of terrorism) hard and with no warning or rationale, at the hearts of families--to induce nothing so much as great fear and confusion. In their plan, they want families to fear birth, yes, and come with their fear to be 'delivered from evil and sorrow' by only medical, hospital based care providers. Even more than they want us to fear birth, they want us to fear THEM; if we won't come to them for services because we fear birth, then by golly we will come to them because we fear their power to hurt us.
As so often happens in homebirth transfer cases, it is not that the family or midwife did something wrong that harmed a mother/baby. It is simply that once you are in the hospital as a homebirth transfer, you become cannon-fodder no matter how healthy mom/baby are--or, no matter how little a problem was linked to homebirth and midwifery care itself. The med ppl don't see it as a good thing that you sought their care when in need--a sensible, responsible choice. It's merely an opportunity for them to attack: You had a homebirth, and now the med ppl know it: that is all it takes to become cannon-fodder. This is especially true in IL, where AMA/ACOG, with much help from their tool, the State Med Board, has been seeking to prevent homebirth through their war of terrror for more than 4 decades now.
I only hope that through the grievously sad and totally infuriating case of Baby Ruth, the State can be legally persuaded that it is wrong for them to oppose reasonable choice. I only hope that through this case, the medical system is forced to stop using State agencies like CPS and the Med Board as their personal tool for enhancing their power and profits. That is what we need to fight for, by supporting Baby Ruth and her parents in all the ways we can--including writing to the prosecutor, the local newspapers, anything we can.
There's a lot of information missing, I can't access the facebook page (because I don't have facebook), and yes, you may be right.
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