Vision of Midwifery by GMC

Midwifery Today is Magazine for Midwives from Midwives. We also have a beautiful online international community where we exchange our experiences and latest progress. Now we hope to go further and create Global Midwifery Council, which will advocate for the best care for mothers and babies

Global Midwifery Council

I have been blessed with many international connections, as well as the ability to travel around the world for Midwifery Today conferences. As far as midwifery and birth are concerned, the situation everywhere is desperate and deteriorating. It is incredibly important for each one of us to do whatever we can to reverse this trend. Motherbaby deserves better. For the past 25 years, writers for Midwifery Today magazine have shared news and information from all over the world. Through conferences, we have met thousands of excellent but struggling midwives. The possibility of a miracle birth for every motherbaby is the goal. The health, and possibly even the survival, of people depend on what we do or don’t do now. This is why the Global Midwifery Council (GMC) was birthed.

Amazing things happen when we meet in Russia, and it was during the joint Midwifery Today/Domashniy Rebenok conference in Russia last year that GMC was born. We have a great group of women working on goals, definitions and NGO status for the organization. 

The GMC’s primary goal is to fight for the human rights of every birthing mother and baby. International training, recognition of family-centered midwifery, preserving and encouraging traditional midwifery, separating midwifery from the medical hierarchical model and giving an international voice to those who already work so hard and need recognition are among the GMC’s many other goals. We plan to help the people of every country who ask for help with midwifery or birth.

One of the ideas we are working on is a “situation room.” My mentor, Marion Toepke McLean, put forth that idea when we were having intense GMC meetings during the Eugene conference. In our situation room, probably a virtual one, we will keep files on the situation of midwifery and birth in every country we learn about. In looking at what we have been doing with Midwifery Today, Wanda, our fabulous Web mistress, and I realized that the GMC has a great start with Midwifery Today’s Web site and magazine. We already have links to many countries’ resources and an extensive list of country contacts. If someone is looking for a midwife, traveling and wanting to meet other midwives or has other needs, we may have a point of contact. (We are always looking for more contacts, so please volunteer if you are available and philosophically aligned with us.) Midwifery Today’s International Alliance of Midwives page includes a definition for midwife and goals, as well as a statement on autonomy by Robbie Davis-Floyd (http://www.midwiferytoday.com/iam/).

Our e-mail boxes are filled with ideas and communication as we outline the GMC’s goals. If you have ideas please e-mail me at jan@midwiferytoday.com and share them. We are a fledgling organization but we are strong and determined to change birth for the better!

— Jan Tritten, mother of Midwifery Today