00:00Geelong mother Rachel Harkin began motherhood on a good note, partly thanks to having the
00:10same midwife through pregnancy.
00:12For me it was such an empowering experience and I feel so fortunate.
00:19We know that it creates great work for sustainability as well for our midwives and it's actually
00:24cost effective.
00:25But despite the benefits of the free midwifery group practice model, many Victorian women
00:30can't access it.
00:32The ABC contacted over 60 publicly funded Victorian health services with just 17 offering MGP
00:40or primary midwife models of care.
00:42And of those 17 services, most cater for just 20% of births due to eligibility and demand.
00:50How are you feeling pregnancy wise actually?
00:52The shortfall puts the financial burden back on women, particularly in rural and regional
00:57areas where they're forced to pay for one-on-one care.
01:00We're not doing it because it's easier or it's cheaper, we're doing it because we have
01:07personal preferences and that's the care we want.
01:10The aim would be that women had the first option to be able to see being seen freely and
01:14then if they chose to see someone privately that would be at their discretion, not because
01:18they had no other options.
01:20The Victorian Maternity Task Force this month released a report showing the state lags behind
01:25the rest of the country in its offering of continuity of care to women in regional areas.
01:31But the Victorian government and individual health services say they're looking at the
01:35capacity of their programs.
01:37I do think it would really benefit so many people, especially first time parents.
01:42Icl 2002 a movie and eventually encourage myself to leave.
01:44CTo 5 is an subtitle piÄ™ precis.
01:49Albert B 첫iedy can sign up a date of a recent видео insurance lead to another
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