AMERICANALMANAC (Ken Jacobs) - Tatyana Ali channels traumatic birth into push for Black and Indigenous maternal care
Actress Tatyana Ali, best known as Ashley Banks on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, is using her own harrowing 2016 delivery-room experience to press for better maternity outcomes for Black and Indigenous mothers, a cause backed by sobering federal data on maternal deaths and vanishing hospital wards. Ali, now 47, told NPR that the birth […] The post Tatyana Ali channels traumatic birth into push for Black and Indigenous maternal care appeared first on American Almanac .
Actress Tatyana Ali, best known as Ashley Banks on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, is using her own harrowing 2016 delivery-room experience to press for better maternity outcomes for Black and Indigenous mothers, a cause backed by sobering federal data on maternal deaths and vanishing hospital wards. Ali, now 47, told NPR that the birth of her first son, Aszi, in 2016 turned from joyful anticipation into what she calls "obstetric violence." Doctors performed the Zavanelli maneuver, a rare, last-resort procedure in which the baby is pushed back into the birth canal, before rushing her into an emergency cesarean section. Ali says she was physically restrained by about four people, convulsed on the delivery table, and watched the room fill…Open