“Pain, screams, blood, fear” are all negative words that have become the first thing that comes to women’s minds when they think about childbirth, even though most of them had never seen a woman give birth before.
A recent survey indicates that many women have an intense fear of childbirth, according to the New York Times, which stated in a report, Tuesday, that although the phenomenon of “tokophobia” is not sufficiently studied in the United States, it may be very common. , especially among women of African descent and poor communities.
Curious about how cultural attitudes and expectations affect the physical experience and outcome of childbirth, Dartmouth College anthropologist Zanetta Thayer set out to assess the prevalence of tokophobia, the medical term for the pathological fear of childbirth.
According to the “New York Times”, “Tokophobia” has been well studied in Scandinavian countries, and accordingly pregnant women undergo certain examinations to discover the condition and provide treatment, but little research has been conducted in the United States.
The survey, the results of which were published in the scientific journal “Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health,” according to the newspaper, found that the majority of American women developed tokophobia in the early days of the “Covid-19” epidemic, with 62 percent of pregnant respondents reporting levels of toxophobia. High fear and anxiety about childbirth.
Other scientists who study childbirth said fear levels in the US are higher than those reported in Europe and Australia, which are less than 20 percent. However, they noted that birth conditions in the United States are different and that the circumstances of the pandemic may have exacerbated concerns.
The study showed that this severe pathological fear pushes women to perform unnecessary cesarean sections or to abstain from pregnancy, according to the newspaper.
More than 80 percent of the women said that because of the pandemic, they were worried about not being able to support them in the hospital during labour, and they were very afraid of contracting Covid and possibly transmitting it to their babies, according to the newspaper.
The New York Times reported that African-American mothers, who face nearly three times the risk of dying from pregnancy-related complications, were twice as likely to develop tokophobia because of their intense fear of childbirth than white mothers.
In the United States, African-American women experience premature births more than any other race or ethnic group, at a rate nearly 50 percent higher than white women, due to increased fears of not having supportive people and their poor financial situation.
As a result, The New York Times reported that about 14 percent of black infants are born premature, compared to just over 9 percent of white and Hispanic infants.
The study also found that women with tokophobia were more likely to give birth prematurely or deliver a baby before 37 weeks of pregnancy.
Newborns are more likely, according to the study published in the newspaper, to suffer from health problems and are more likely to suffer disability and death, and they often spend time in intensive care.
2023-05-17 03:59:33
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