Illinois General Assembly passes bills aimed at helping mothers
[May 28, 2025]
By Jade Aubrey and UIS Public Affairs Reporting (PAR)
SPRINGFIELD – Illinois lawmakers passed two bills this week that aim to
support mothers in the state.
One bill requires employers to give paid time off to employees who pump
breastmilk at work. The second allows midwives to help with home births,
which is the latest attempt by Illinois lawmakers to restore access to
maternal health care in the state’s maternity care deserts.
House Bill 2688, sponsored by Rep. Anna Moeller, D-Elgin, would allow
certified nurse midwives to enter a written agreement with a physician
to provide or assist with home births. In designated maternity care
deserts, they can enter into such an agreement even if the local
physicians don’t provide home births.
The bill only applies to certified nurse midwives, who must be a
licensed advanced practice registered nurse, or APRN, and have at least
a graduate degree in midwifery. It does not give the same privileges to
certified midwives, who are required to have a graduate degree in
midwifery.
In recent years, the number of home births across the nation has been
steadily rising. The CDC reported that 51,642 home births took place
across the country in 2021. That number was a 12% increase from the
number of home births in 2020, which the CDC said was the largest
increase since at least 1990.
The rise in home births in Illinois is often attributed to the rise in
the state’s maternity care deserts, which are counties without a single
hospital, birth center, or licensed health care professional who offers
obstetric care.
According to a report from March of Dimes, a nonprofit focused on
improving maternal health care across the U.S., about 34% of Illinois
counties are labeled maternity care deserts. The nationwide average is
about 32% of all U.S. counties.
The CDC reported that nearly 35% of women living rural areas that are of
reproductive age did not live within 30 minutes of a birthing hospital
in 2023.
March of Dimes reported that women living in counties with the highest
travel times to a birthing hospital had to travel anywhere between 47
and 59 miles. They also found that women living in maternity care
deserts had to travel a little more than 5 times as far as women living
in areas of the state with adequate access to maternity care.
“This bill addresses the maternity care deserts that exist in our state
to give certified nurse midwives the ability to collaborate with other
nurse midwives and APRNs to provide such care,” Moeller said during a
House committee hearing on the bill in March.
Illinois’ recent history around the legality of midwives also played a
role in the recent increase of maternity care deserts in the state.
Although midwives have been used and recognized as health care
professionals for centuries, when hospitals began to be recognized as
the safest health care settings in the late 1900s, many states stopped
licensing midwives and even outlawed the practice altogether.
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State Rep. Katie Stuart, D-Edwardsville, speaks to chief of staff
Clayton Harris shortly after passing a bill that mandates employers
give nursing mothers paid time to pump breast milk. (Capitol News
Illinois photo by Jerry Nowicki)
In Illinois, state officials stopped licensing midwives in the mid-1960s
and outlawed the practice in 1992 – making the act a felony with
punishments of fines up to $10,000 or three years in prison – according
to NPR Illinois.
A law passed in 2021 reversed that decision, making midwifery in the
state legal and again allowing for midwives to be legally licensed.
HB 2688 also allows nurse midwives, if they are APRNs, to provide birth
services in a licensed birth center without a written agreement if the
director of the birth center allows them to. Under the bill, physicians
will not be liable for the acts or omissions of nurse midwives solely
because of the agreement, unless the physician “has reason to believe”
the midwife was unprepared to perform the services or committed willful
and wanton conduct.
The bill passed the Senate on Thursday with a vote of 57-1, with only
Sen. Jil Tracy, R-Quincy, voting no. It now awaits approval from the
governor to become law.
Paid time off to pump breast milk
Senate Bill 212 mandates employers to compensate mothers who take breaks
at work to pump breast milk for up to a year after their child is born.
The bill prohibits employers from requiring employees to use paid leave
time for pumping.
“I believe many employers are already doing the right thing, and, you
know, we just need to compel a few of them to make sure they are also
supporting mothers and babies,” Rep. Katie Stuart, D-Edwardsville, said
on the House floor Wednesday.
During a news conference in February, bill sponsor Sen. Laura Fine,
D-Glenview, said she would have benefitted from the bill when she had
children.
“I know for me, we did not have the generosity of these rules and
regulations to allow me to take that break to take care of my child,”
Fine said. “So, it would be hiding in a bathroom, getting away when you
possibly could and actually having to stop breastfeeding early when it
couldn’t work out.”
The bill passed the House Wednesday on a bipartisan vote of 82-27. It
now only needs approval from the governor to become law.
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