KSHB 41 reporter Megan Abundis covers Kansas City, Missouri, including neighborhoods in the southern part of the city. Megan received this story idea from her previous coverage on the Missouri Department of Corrections Nursery Program in Vandalia, Missouri. Share your story idea with Megan.
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Missouri Appleseed is requesting state funding for doulas to support incarcerated women during pregnancy and childbirth, building on the success of the state's prison nursery program.
The nonprofit organization plans to ask for doula funding during the current legislative session through the Missouri Department of Corrections budget. Executive Director Mary Quandt said the initiative has support from within the corrections department itself.
Current Missouri Department of Corrections policy doesn’t allow women to bring any support people to a birth appointment or labor and delivery.
“This is actually spearheaded by people within DOC,” Quandt said.
Quandt says they would plan to partner with Missouri-based community doulas.
“Missouri has a really fast-growing population of incarcerated women,” she said.
She said approximately 25 women give birth in DOC custody annually.
A doula is a trained non-medical birth support person who can attend prenatal appointments and the labor and delivery.
Quandt estimates doula services will cost $1,500 per pregnant inmate.
“Even if we round up to 30 women, that’s only about 40,000 per year,” she said.
Quandt believes doula services could improve birth outcomes while being cost-effective.
“Providing doulas for 25-30 women who give birth to DOC custody this year, of those women, if we can reduce two cesarean sections and one pre-term infant, that would save more than the $40,000 that it would cost to provide comprehensive, compassionate, and dignified doula services to all the women who give birth in DOC custody,” she said.
Quandt said the non-profit organization focuses on legislative advocacy and education at the intersection of criminal justice, public health, and child welfare. The effort in 2022 to create a prison nursery was passed in a single legislative year with bipartisan support.
“Missouri is the only state that actually funds its prison nursery,” Mary Quandt said. “We’re not based on donations; it’s a part of the budget.”
The prison nursery opened its doors last year, where 16 babies were born in the first year.
“The U.S. government says about 1% of incarcerated women will be pregnant or experience pregnancy while they are incarcerated,” she said. “The majority of women who are incarcerated are incarcerated in their childbearing years, and the vast majority are already mothers or are pregnant or soon to be mothers.”
Quandt said doula support could also reduce postpartum depression and birth trauma, potentially lowering recidivism rates.
“I’m encouraged, I think we can get it across the finish line, and Missourians think this is a no-brainer win for Missouri families,” she said.
She also mentioned Missouri Appleseed's ongoing efforts to restore voting rights for individuals on probation and parole, as well as their support for the Missouri Survivors Justice Act, which aims to allow judges to consider domestic violence in sentencing.
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