Midwives reach out to women-wherever they live/Les sages-femmes tendent la main aux femmes--ou qu'elles se trouvent dans le monde/Las matronas tienden la mano a las mujeres-dondequiera que vivan.

• Position: The International Day of the Midwife 2007

The unique quality of midwifery is its model of a continuum of care for women and their babies wherever they need it: in the home, the community, the hospital

'Reaching out' is an important part of a midwife's job, not just to provide care for women who live a long way from a health facility, but to overcome other barriers to access. It is 'woman-centred' care that brings healthy outcomes for mother and baby and that means positive action from midwives to ensure that what they offer is what women want.

The World Health Report 2005, Make every mother and child count. called for 'care that is close to women' and 'close to where and how people live, close to their birthing culture, but at the same time safe, ... [with] a midwife, or a person with equivalent skills'. It is clear from situations such as that in the far north of Canada where midwifery has been restored, after a time when all pregnant women were flown to hospital elsewhere to give birth, that its return is welcomed by all: the birth of babies among their own people breathes life back into a community.

The ICM is committed to the goal of universal access to midwifery care for childbearing women, and to providing this as close as possible to where women live. The ICM's Definition of the Midwife states that 'A midwife may practise in any setting including the home, community, hospitals, clinics or...