Freedom for Birth

Women's Rights in Childbirth

Featuring a who's who of world class experts, Freedom For Birth is a 58 minute documentary looking at the issue of women's rights in childbirth.

In many countries around the world, women are being denied the most basic human right of autonomy over their own bodies. They cannot choose how and where to give birth. Those that persist in having a normal vaginal birth are sometimes forced by judges to have a c-section or threatened with having their babies taken away by child welfare services.

In many countries, if a woman wants to have a home birth supported by a midwife, those midwives face criminal prosecution. Some midwives, like Agnes Gereb in Hungary, are even imprisoned.

The film tells the story of a young mother from Hungary, Anna Ternovszky, who took her country to the European Court of Human Rights and won a landmark ruling that now gives every woman in Europe the legal right to choose the circumstances of her birth.

Featuring the world's leading academics, doctors, midwives and human rights lawyers, Freedom for Birth calls for radical reform to the world's maternity systems so that human rights violations stop and women are afforded real choice as to how and where they give birth.

Freedom for Birth premiered on 20th September 2012 with over 1,100 public screenings in over 50 countries in 17 languages with an estimated combined global audience of over 100,000 seeing the film on one day.