Because of an adverse birth incident the Czech midwife Ivana Konigsmarkova was sentenced to two years of imprisonment and suspended from working as a midwife for five years. Her supporters called for a protest rally in Prague for the 17th of October and Agnes Gereb wrote a personal letter of support to Ivana which was read out at the rally. Also a small deputation went to the Czech Embassy in Hungary and requested that Agnes's letter be passed to both the Ministers for Health and Justice of the Czech Republic.       

Dear Ivana,

Although I presume you are not able to hear what is being read to you in this moment,  I do hope that my message  will find its way to you somehow.

I know how difficult it is to lose a baby or to see a baby suffering permanent damage. It is hard for the parents, for society and also for us, midwives and doulas. It is very, very hard. I wish I could hold you in my arms. In my embrace I would like to give you support in what you must also know well, namely that in the presence of  birth and birthing, death can also be present, even when there is nobody to blame.

I believe that the important step forward is that according to our best knowledge it should be revealed where an adverse birth event occurs , whether anyone has made a mistake, and if so, in what way have  they made that mistake . It is also equally important that we should acknowledge when a mistake is made in order to learn from it and to enable us to improve. This is why the existence of an independent, knowledgeable, competent and unbiased advisory board on midwifery birth incidents is essential.  This board should enquire into our case, similar to the proceedings at hospitals, where after the death of a mother or a new-born baby there is an internal inquiry instead of immediate criminal litigation. In fact the very existence and outcome of these hospital birth incidents only become known to the public if the parents decide to bring a prosecution case before the civil courts.  By complete contrast Hungarian midwives have no access whatsoever to an internal professional inquiry system and instead they become instantly involved with a police investigation without any prior independent, competent and unbiased inquiry.

It would be of some comfort to us midwives who have been treated in an unequal and unfair way in the criminal investigation stage if the court procedures would help to correct these injustices when our cases came before them. But as we know from firsthand experience Ivana, this doesn't happen.  We expected that at least the court should aim to meet its own requirements when using professional experts.  The National Institute of Forensic Medicine has a 9 point recommendation on procedures to be followed by their experts when giving opinion in court. The Institute states that it is in the uncompromising interest of society that the expert's opinion should be factual, reliable, objective and of professional quality. If there is even a single opinion that is at fault, is mistaken or incorrect, it will lead to the wrong decision by the authority and could become the source of unfair justice at court, besides being the reason for undermining the authority of the whole advisory board. The sentence of the two-year imprisonment and of the five-year suspension from medical practice, which was your judgement as far as I know, is strangely similar to my case. I can't believe you could have received this sentence if the experts in your case had produced a completely reliable, pertinent, objective and scientifically adequate opinion. In my case, they certainly didn't.

Please don't give up, the truth will prevail!

Although we have never met, I am reaching out to you with all my love.

 

Dr. Ágnes Geréb,

Independent Midwife

Budapest, Hungary

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Dear Minister for Health, Mr Leos Heger and

Minister for Justice, Mr Jiri Pospisil of the Czech Republic

Attached you will find a letter that I have written in support of my colleague and Czech midwife Ivana Konigsmarkova who, because of her involvement in an adverse homebirth incident, recently and unfairly received a criminal sentence and an extended work suspension.

My letter to Ivana will also be read out at the protest gathering which takes place in Prague this Monday the 17th, October, 2011.

The points in my letter are two fold and directly concern your areas of responsibility. Similiar to requests that we are making to our own Hungarian Government I call upon you both to introduce the necessary legal changes in the Czech Republic which will ensure in future that Independent Midwives assisting at homebirths receive equal treatment with hospital maternity doctors and will no longer have to automatically go before the criminal courts when adverse birth incidents are being investigated.

Also, that so long as Independent Midwives are forced to go before the criminal courts to defend their birth actions that the court system should at the very minimum ensure that a midwife has the possibility of receiving a fair and just trial. This is certainly not the case in either Hungary or the Czech Republic at present, particularly in relation to the conduct of court expert witnesses, who are supposed to be impartial and familiar with the subject before the court but who inevitably have no direct homebirth experience and maintain a biased position against the right to homebirth and the safety of homebirth.

I hope you will both take this opportunity presented by the mistreatment of Ivana to look at this whole area of inequality and injustice to Independent Midwives attending homebirths and bring in the necessary legal changes in compliance with modern trends throughout Europe and the Western world

 

With sincere thanks

 

Dr. Agnes Gereb
Independent Midwife
Budapest, Hungary.