A new short film about New Zealand families and their homebirth experiences aims to empower more Pacific women to give birth at home.
According to the Ministry of Health Pacific, women made up less than one per cent of mothers giving birth at home, the lowest rate in the country.
Midwife Sharon Robinson funded the film and says there are some misconceptions among pacific communities about giving births in hospital as opposed to giving birth at home.
I think that there’s a perception that Maori and Pacific people have that hospitals are really just the best place to be.
“They think they’ve come to New Zealand to get the best from the healthcare that it has to offer, they go to the hospital,” said Ms Robinson.
“But they don’t maybe have information about the benefits of staying at home that they’re giving up when they go to the hospital.”
Tongan-Maori mother Vasiti Palavi featured in the documentary with the home birth of her second child.
She said many of her pacific island friends also had the view that hospitals were the best place for giving birth, a perception passed down from their mothers who saw hospital births as a western privilege.
“She (her friend) talked about that in Samoa, if you have on your birth certificate that you were born in the hospital, then that’s some kind of elevated status. Whereas if you don’t and you have it at some other place around in the bush or somewhere, then it doesn’t get looked on very well,” explained Ms Palavi
“I think that there’s a perception that Maori and Pacific people have that hospitals are really just the best place to be.”
Ms Robinson said there is also a lack of awareness about the safety of home births.
“There’s a cultural and a spiritual and an emotional and psychological safety that often isn’t part of the equation at the hospital when safety is being considered.”
