#361 | Is Water Birth Dangerous? Barbara Harper Debunks Fallacies

#361 | Is Water Birth Dangerous? Barbara Harper Debunks Fallacies

From Down to Birth by Cynthia Overgard & Trisha Ludwig

April 1, 2026 · 1h 8m · Season 7 · Episode 361

About this episode

Barbara Harper discusses the safety of water birth and debunks myths surrounding it.

Water birth has long been controversial, but more recently, a wave of claims has emerged from the natural birth community that water birth is dangerous for babies and disruptive to the physiologic process of birth. In this episode, we sit down with midwife Barbara Harper, the world's leading expert on water birth and founder of Waterbirth International, to explain the preponderance of evidence supporting the safety of water birth and to dispel circulating fallacies. We talk about the idea tha...

People in this episode

Guest: Barbara Harper

Topics covered

  • water birth
  • safety
  • midwifery
  • natural birth
  • physiologic process

Keywords

  • waterbirth
  • birth safety
  • natural birth community
  • fallacies

Mentioned in this episode

Products: Waterbirth International

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