Birth data released today by the CDC show a 6 percent increase in the cesarean rate and a 16 percent drop in the VBAC rate for 2003. The International Cesarean Awareness Network (ICAN) attributes this to the loss of VBAC at more than 300 hospitals nationwide. In Florida, 16 hospitals now ban VBAC and require repeat cesarean as a woman's only birth option, one of which is right here in Tallahassee. Some will blame the cesarean rate increase on women choosing elective cesareans, but in fact less than 3 percent of all U.S. births are elective cesareans, according to a Health Grades study published this summer.

In response to this information, a new chapter of ICAN has formed in Tallahassee, FL.

In June 1982, Esther Booth Zorn -- widely recognized as the country's leading voice in a growing chorus to reduce the nation's high cesarean rate -- conceived the Cesarean Prevention Movement (CPM) at her dining room table with Liz Belden Handler. Zorn is credited for bringing the issue to national prominence -- and for successfully challenging the long-held "once a cesarean, always a cesarean" dictum that for years has been regarded as gospel. In 1992, the name was changed from the CPM to ICAN, or the International Cesarean Awareness Network.

Please see the previous press release from ICAN headquarters, endorsed by seven women's health organizations. At the close of this story is a list of Florida Hospitals that are banning VBACs currently. If anyone knows anything about a hospital not on this list, please contact me with a correction. Thank you.