‘Birthing on Country’: Search for South Coast site for centre for Aboriginal women
Discrimination against Aboriginal women has made it hard for mothers to trust in medical services, say advocates, as a groundbreaking centre receives support to find a home.
The South Coast News
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More than 50 years has passed since the last Aboriginal children were taken from their mothers in NSW in what became known as the stolen generation.
But, for many young mothers, those memories are still alive today.
“There’s a lot of distrust among Aboriginal women in mainstream medical services,” South Coast midwife and First Nation woman, Melanie Briggs said.
“There’s fear around having their children taken, or having reports made against them.
“Aboriginal women aren’t accessing medical services because they don’t feel safe.”
Ms Briggs is the first and only endorsed Aboriginal midwife working in NSW, and is one of only two in the whole of Australia.
For more than five years, she has been working on a ground-breaking new initiative with Nowra-based Aboriginal women’s organisation Waminda, called Birthing On Country.
The program aims at tackling disproportionate rates of infant mortality and complications among Aboriginal mothers by training First Nations women to become midwives.
“There’s not enough Aboriginal midwives to look after Aboriginal women,” she said.
“When it comes to cultural safety, our women aren’t accessing services because they’re not being looked after by Aboriginal midwives.
“If you’re not comfortable with a service, you’re not going to go in, so if you’ve got problems, you’re not going to get it looked at.”
Aboriginal women are three times more likely to have a stillbirth, Ms Briggs said, with a higher rate of premature births creating ongoing complications, including chronic disease.
Waminda plans on redesigning the maternity service, not just by including more Aboriginal women but also by extending the care provided to mothers so that they deal with a single person through all stages.
“The model needs to be community led,” Ms Briggs said.
On Tuesday, the project took an important step closer to realisation after the Shoalhaven City Council voted unanimously to help Waminda find a site in the Nowra CBD for the clinic.
Mayor Amanda Finley introduced the motion in her mayoral minute at the council’s ordinary session on Tuesday, and urged the council to support the centre.
“One of the things that Waminda needs is some land on which to build the On Country centre, and I am asking councillors to pledge to work with them actively,” she said.
“What that will mean is some of our staffing resource time will be allocated to help them locate any possibility of land within the Shoalhaven.
“Particularly around the Nowra CBD and the Bomaderry CBD as they want that to be accessible through transport and to people who are living in and around the city.”
Ms Finley said the centre would allow Aboriginal women and babies to grow and “live their happiest life”.
“The program has got many runs on the board already, and has been widely acknowledged by those in the health profession as being a seriously good way of managing health and health outcomes for people in the community,” she said.
The council voted unanimously to support the motion.
It comes as the electoral race in Gilmore heats up ahead of the 2022 election.
Incumbent Labor candidate Fiona Phillips announced in February that Labor would provide $22 million for the program, should they be elected on May 31.
Speaking to The South Coast News in February, Ms Phillips said the program was a practical way of achieving improved health outcomes for Aboriginal mothers.
“It is about providing a holistic sort of maternal, child, and family health care that’s really culturally appropriate, as well,” she said.
“We know that the greater investment that we can put into women’s health and reducing child mortality … that’s a huge thing.”
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