Families who claim Bermuda Medical Council is preventing them from having safe home births are continuing their protests today at the Ministry of Health.

Expectant parents and their supporters are taking it in turns to request meetings with Health permanent secretary Kevin Monkman in a bid to get permission for two overseas midwives to come to the Island for two imminent births.

Tereah Rayner, 21, of Paget, was at the Ministry’s headquarters in the Continental Building in Hamilton this morning, when she told The Royal Gazette: “I am actually due next week. It’s important to me to have a home birth because the baby comes out naturally and that’s how it should be.”

Ms Rayner is expecting her first child, a boy, on June 1. She said: “I don’t believe it should be in a facility. I feel we should have the right to have a birth at home or hospital or wherever we please. I don’t think there should be a law to say we have to have it in a certain place.”

As reported earlier this week, a number of expectant parents who were hoping to bring overseas midwives to the Island to assist with their home births have been told that Immigration approval will not be given because there is no longer a medical practitioner here who is willing to supervise the labours.

The doctor who previously supervised home births in Bermuda resigned due to other work commitments and a replacement has not yet been found.

A Department of Health spokeswoman said on Monday: “The Department of Health has long supported a woman’s right to choose the environment in which she delivers a child. Constraints on this choice are placed only in the interest of safety and health for mother and baby.

“Birth can be safe in both home and healthcare settings as long as certain conditions are met. One of the most important of these conditions is that the birth is attended by a trained healthcare professional; that is, a midwife or physician experienced in home deliveries.”

Chief medical officer Cheryl Peek-Ball told campaigners in an e-mail earlier this week: “The Ministry is eager to be of assistance to the families disappointed by the pending registration of the midwives and are working to identify a short-term solution which is safe and reasonable.”

She suggested that a meeting with families be held early next week but the parents want the issue to be discussed sooner. In the meantime, they want the Department of Health to issue “letters of no objection” to the Department of Immigration to ensure the two midwives can come to Bermuda in time for the births.

Ms Rayner said she wasn’t sure what she would do if her midwife wasn’t given permission. “I’m very stressed about it. My birth is next week and they want to decline it [permission]. I’m trying to get my midwife here.

“As far as knowing what I’m going to do — I don’t know. I do believe that we will be able to get through this.”