Dr Jonathan Lord, medical director for MSI Reproductive Choices, speaking on behalf of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, warns doctors that they must not report to the police any woman suspected of an illegal abortion. He said that new guidance will state that a healthcare worker must “justify” any disclosure of patient data or “face potential fitness to practice proceedings”. The RCOG has released a statement saying that it “is soon to publish best practice guidance for healthcare professionals, outlining that they are under no legal obligation to contact the police following an abortion…”
Lord’s warning to medics comes, as he points out, in the context of a rise in the number of such cases being reported by NHS staff to the police. In its report, the BBC reveals: “In 2022, the number of suspected illegal abortions logged with police forces in England and Wales rose to 29, from 16 in 2018.” This is not exactly the exponential, terrifying, rise that Lord and others often talk about, especially when advocating for the decriminalisation of abortion.
I share Lord’s concern that police investigations, and any subsequent prosecutions can cause undue stress and trauma for these vulnerable women, who need sensitive safeguarding care and support.
Let us pause for a moment and consider why these women have presented to an NHS facility following or even during their abortion. In its ‘Best practice in abortion care’, updated in 2022, the RCOG notes that for medical abortions when gestational age is 14-weeks or more, there is a 13% risk that the abortion will be incomplete, a complication often referred to as retained products of conception (RPOC), and that a further medical intervention will be required to complete the procedure, to avoid prolonged bleeding or infection. Perhaps this is why these women are seeking medical care at an NHS facility?
That said, this is a problem of his own making. Lord and his collaborators have enabled this increasing number of women using abortion pills later in their pregnancies, beyond the ten-week legal limit. Some of the women that he points to as having been investigated and prosecuted, will no doubt have obtained the abortion pills from his own organisation, MSI-RC, using its telemedicine and pills-by-post process.
There is a remarkably simple and straightforward solution to the trauma caused by the rising number of police investigations – rescind the legal approval for abortion by phone and pills-by-post, reinstate a mandated in-person medical consultation before the abortion pills are prescribed.
Percuity 