Government Must Fund More Midwives in Nova Scotia

SUSAN LEBLANC: Speaker, midwifery-led births account for only 5 per cent of total births in Nova Scotia, far below the national average of 14 per cent, and I can table that. This is a disservice for expectant mothers in Nova Scotia, given many positive health outcomes associated. Midwifery support leads to more natural births, a decrease in C-sections and surgical interventions, easier breastfeeding initiation, and it decreases the chance of having a pre-term birth. Not only does it take the stress off new moms, but it also takes stress off our hospitals. Does the Minister of Health and Wellness recognize the importance of midwifery care in our health care system?

HON. MICHELLE THOMPSON: I spoke about this yesterday in the Chamber. Certainly, midwives have a role to play in prenatal, obstetrical, and gynecological care. In fact, there are things that they can do around supporting women’s wellness. We have a couple of areas outside of the city. IWK has some midwives, and we do have some areas. It certainly is not easy to maintain the staffing complement in those areas. We’re also making sure that midwives are part of a team. We need to ensure that they have nurses who are around them. We need to make sure they have primary care physicians who do obstetrics. We need to make sure they have specialty services to support them. Yes, many deliveries are usual and regular, but we need to make sure that they have the infrastructure around them. We do continue to look at women’s health issues, and we’ll continue to assess the situation as we move forward.

SUSAN LEBLANC: As the minister’s response shows, it’s hard to ignore the benefits of midwives that they add to our health care system. Investment in midwives is simply a smart policy, yet there are only 16 funded positions and 3 practices in the province. Many communities across Nova Scotia, as the minister said, lack essential midwifery care. The budget yesterday was a missed opportunity for this government to address the critical shortage. Why is this government not investing in midwives? MICHELLE THOMPSON: Nova Scotians are not missing out on good, quality, excellent obstetrical and gynecological care in this province, and midwives are a part of that team, but they are not the only members on that team. We know that midwives play a role. We have 16 positions. To date, they have been very difficult to date to fill. We continue to work with Nova Scotia Health and IWK to better understand how to support them.

THE SPEAKER: Order. The time allotted for Oral Questions Put by Members to Ministers has expired.

Need for Midwifery Investment

SUSAN LEBLANC: My question is for the Minister of Health and Wellness. Nova Scotians have been asking government for years to invest in more midwifery services across the province. There is still zero service in Cape Breton and the Valley. Midwives in the region have been working on establishing an education program, which is a key piece of the puzzle, and they have asked for a study on how to make it happen. FOIPOP documents from the minister’s department show the process was moving along nicely until it was squashed at the last minute from the very top decision-makers. I can table that. Can the minister explain why her government is so resistant to supporting midwives and new parents that they won’t even undertake a simple study asked for by midwives across the region?

HON. MICHELLE THOMPSON: Just to let the member know, we’re currently focusing on stabilizing our current midwifery services across the province. There are some issues around recruitment and retention. I also want to make note that we do have an unattached baby clinic. Certainly, the midwives in this province have been instrumental in supporting that. We are using midwives to the best of our scope, but currently, the focus is on stabilizing current midwifery services.

SUSAN LEBLANC: Perhaps we’ll have a chance to talk about retention in Estimates, but after this government tabled its budget last week, speaking of Estimates, our caucus heard from midwives and health advocates who were heartbroken that another budget has been tabled with no new investment in midwifery, including no new midwifery services in Cape Breton, where there was the highest rate of C-sections in low-risk pregnancies in the province between 2017 and 2020. C-sections are the most common kind of surgery, and midwives can help lower these rates and free up hospital resources, but we have to invest in them. If this government will spend whatever it takes to fix health care, why does it continue to refuse to implement the sensible and affordable suggestion to invest in primary care that will benefit pregnant people and free up other primary care providers in this system?

MICHELLE THOMPSON: Certainly, this has been a historic budget in terms of our investment in health care- More, Faster. We certainly are committed to improving primary care access, and again, we go back to the fact that we need to stabilize our current services before we spread ourselves too thin and make the program not available to anyone.