Filmmaker: Julie Heathcote
Producer: Emma Wakefield

Being a homebirth midwife in Hungary is a dangerous occupation, as the case of obstetrician Agnes Gereb shows. Despite having delivered several thousand babies, Gereb is currently on trial.

This film examines the growing criminalisation of homebirth midwives and explores the underlying issues behind Hungary's controversial conservative policies: Are they driven by money, control of women by the medical profession - or both?

Those against home births point to high survival rates for women delivering in hospital, but behind these figures lie very high levels of medical intervention, C-section rates and increasingly medicalised labour.

Update: On March 24, 2011 Agnes Gereb was found guilty of medical negligence in two separate home births, including one in which a baby died. She will have to spend at least a year behind bars before parole and has also been banned from practising both as an obstetrician and a midwife for five years.

In February 2012, Dr Gereb lost her appeal against her two-year prison sentence. She was banned from working as a midwife for 10 years, a doubling of the initial court ruling. She remains under house arrest and has appealed to the new president of Hungary, Janos Ader, for a full pardon.

Agnes Kiraly, another person mentioned in the film, was found guilty of negligence and she was fined heavily. The fine has been paid now.