Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward wrote:
I mentioned a while back that of all the women I know who've had
babies, the only one who didn't receive some kind of medical
intervention at birth was the woman who had the baby at home. Everyone
else was either induced, augmented, c-sectioned, or forcepsed. I
exclude epidurals from the list deliberately (all but the home-birth
friend had them).

I was curious if there are any statistics in the US on exactly how many
natural births occur in hospitals here.

My hospital provides stats on percentage inductions, percentage
c-sections, etc, but doesn't give percentage non-interventions, so I
don't have a realistic idea of how many of their 'patients' get meds to
assist with the birth.

I doubt it, since people vary a lot in what they
consider a "natural" birth. I think nationally, inductions
are around 40 percent now. C-sections are, what, 27 percent?
Augmentation is, I think, higher than induction, but I'm not sure
of the actual number. Instrumental delivery I forget.
And then there are considerations of what other
interventions are acceptable to you: IV? continuous
or intermittent EFM? managed third stage? immediate
cord clamping? And, of course, there's also the question
of how many women are attempting to *achieve* a natural
birth (by whatever your definition is).
I think your best bet to figure your odds of
success is to ask potential caregivers about each
intervention and see a) whether they're fine with
your refusing it (or under what circumstances they'd
be uncomfortable with avoiding it) and b) how experienced
they are with births not using that intervention. If
they're not comfortable with your avoiding the intervention
or if they rarely do births without that intervention,
then that's a red flag.

Best wishes,
Ericka