Winter Haven, FL – TIME© named Jennie Joseph, an internationally renowned midwife who practices in Central Florida, to its first-ever TIME© Women of the Year List, recognizing 12 extraordinary leaders fighting for a more equal world.
Jennie Joseph“Jennie fights to ensure every person has their healthiest possible pregnancy, birth and postpartum experience with dignity and support,” stated Commonsense Childbirth, Inc. CEO, Dr. Deanna Wathington. “We, at Commonsense Childbirth, were ecstatic for Jennie when we learned she would be selected, but we also know that her work to reduce Black infant mortality in Florida and beyond makes her rightly suited to be honored as part of this inaugural list of phenomenal women.”
Jennie Joseph, a British-trained midwife, created The JJ Way®, which is an evidence-based, maternity care model delivering readily accessible, patient-centered, culturally congruent care to women in areas that she terms 'materno-toxic zones'. Her focus and drive are to ensure that Black women and other marginalized people remain safe and empowered inside broken and inequitable maternity health systems that have become dangerous and all too often, lethal.
She is the founder of Commonsense Childbirth Inc. which operates a training institute, health clinics and a birthing center in Orlando, Florida, and is also the creator of the National Perinatal Task Force, a grassroots organization whose mission is the elimination of racial disparities in maternal child health in the USA. Jennie is the founder and a proud member of The Council of Midwifery Elders, she serves on the Advisory Council for the Congressional Black Maternal Health Caucus and is a Fellow of The Aspen Institute. She also operates a Midwifery School and helps other birthing clinics adopt her JJ Way model to address birthing disparities and maternal mortality.
