09.24 – Wednesday 1 May 2024
Dear director Franceschi,
I attach what was published today in the newspaper “Corriere del Trentino”, also to allow the readers of Opinione to view it.
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Luca Guglielmi
Ladin provincial councilor
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Birth points bastions of autonomy,
some time after my last intervention on the topic of the so-called Birth Points, I am preparing to have my say, stimulated by many interventions, by the many meetings with doctors and specialists on the topic and, last but not least, by my wife’s fourth pregnancy (I now consider myself a expert).
The first reflection concerns the interventions of trade unionists, technicians, provincial councilors, mayors, presidents of associations and I don’t know who else anymore: all proposing solutions based on numbers, on investigations, on medical literature, on apocalyptic future scenarios. Some are misled by shop interests, others by a lack of habit of thinking like autonomists and mountain people.
My version starts from the assumption that no one can talk about what it means to live in the mountains or valleys, hours away from the capital, without knowing what it really means to live two hours from Trento. I therefore allow myself to define whatever decision was made on the Birth Points as a political decision, based on the consideration that all the facilities in the area that guarantee local populations better and quicker solutions to their problems must be strenuously defended. The Fugatti Councils chose in 2018 to restore the Birth Points previously closed (due to political decisions) and to confirm this decision in 2023.
The current situation is portrayed by those who are misled by numbers and preconceptions as disastrous and dangerous: nothing could be further from the truth. Those who, like me, have frequented and frequent a decentralized birth center, know perfectly well the professionalism, the love for the work they do and the joy of being a fundamental support for all the midwives and doctors who animate the decentralized departments of the Birth Centers. And let’s stop defining the situation of the decentralized Birth Centers as dangerous: I and the other parents who rely on these departments have the utmost confidence in their abilities and in their absolute good faith, demonstrated several times, ready to divert to the city hospital all situations which, even remotely, lead to the presumption of danger for the pregnant woman or the unborn child.
Anyone who, like me, thinks only of the good of his wife and his future child (in my case the fourth boy), smiles, really smiles, when compared to the arguments regarding the costs of a birth in a decentralized facility, because he does not accept that we talk about costs in this case and no one has anything to object if a museum costs millions a year or any sporting initiative requires public funds. And here I stop to avoid misunderstandings: the resources dedicated to newborns are always too few, whichever way you look at the problem.
I therefore reiterate that all births that take place in Birth Centers are safe births because no parent, no midwife, no doctor would jeopardize the safety of a newborn or a woman giving birth who, in the event of an even slightly problematic pregnancy, is immediately set your sights on moving around the city.
But above all I would like to point out that the political decision to continue to support and finance the decentralized departments, be they Birth Centers or other, was confirmed with the elections six months ago, and no one can think of returning to that topic without questioning the most sacred of democratic decisions, the will of the people.
 * DECENTRALIZED BIRTH POINTS: « THEY ARE BASTIONS OF AUTONOMY, LET’S STOP DEFINITING THEM DANGEROUS »){kind=link}