Debbie Hayton Debbie Hayton

Why are midwives being told that biological men can give birth?

(Photo: iStock)

Edinburgh Napier University claims to be one of the largest providers of nursing and midwifery education in Scotland. It now seems they are expanding their remit to the care and treatment of pregnant males.

This is Nicola Sturgeon’s Scotland after all, where the SNP government passed legislation that redefined ‘woman’ to include those who have ‘taken the decision to undergo a process for the purpose of becoming female.’ The Court of Session in Edinburgh has since ruled that decision breached equality law. But it is surely beyond parody that now a school of nursing and midwifery is teaching students that biological males can get pregnant and give birth.

Course materials obtained by the feminist website, Reduxx, and reported this week, contain some truly jaw dropping lines Napier university is telling its students:

‘It is important to note that while most times the birthing person will have female genitalia, you may be caring for a pregnant or birthing person who is transitioning from male to female and may still have external male genitalia.’

Whatever genitalia we might retain, this is simply impossible. People like me who have transitioned ‘from male-to-female’ cannot be a ‘birthing person.’ Despite the potentially confusing terminology, we remain biologically male whatever changes we might make to our bodies. Human beings are mammals, and the gestation of the young is a matter for females – actual females, biological females – and we are not that.

Napier’s guidance does not appear to be a mistake, or confused with ‘female-to-male’ transsexuals like Freddy McConnell who can and do get pregnant. The materials go on to tell the student midwives that they need to be familiar with the catheterisation procedure ‘for both female and male anatomy.’ When removing catheters, the midwife need to warn male persons of ‘discomfort as the deflated balloon passes though the prostate gland.

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