26 October 2007

MPs plan liberalisation of British abortion law

The House of Commons Science and Technology Committee is likely to boost attempts to make abortions easier, reports the Times (London).

The cross-party Science and Technology Committee (STC), which will consider changes to abortion law in a report next month, will not make firm recommendations but MPs said that the scientific and medical evidence pointed to the case for change.

MPs will propose that women be allowed to seek an abortion on the basis of informed consent – dropping the requirement for two doctors’ signatures – and perform the second stage of a medical termination at home rather than at a hospital or clinic, the Times reports. The MPs also want nurses rather than doctors to be allowed to carry out abortions in the first trimester of pregnancy, up to 12 weeks. Anti-abortion MPs say privately that they may not have the numbers to oppose the moves. MPs will have a free vote on the changes, probably early next year.

The STC report is likely to imply that research backs the current upper time limit for most abortions of 24 weeks’ gestation, and does not support a lower limit, as opponents of abortion want. ‘Most babies born at 22 weeks do not survive. If they do, they are likely to have severe abnormalities. Most at 23 weeks will not survive,’ one member of the committee said.

The report is also likely to call for the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, the independent health advisory body, to take over the task of publishing guidelines for practitioners and expectant mothers seeking a termination. This advice is produced currently by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. Antiabortion campaigners say its members have a vested interest in performing terminations.

Plans to relax law on early abortion. The Times, 25 October 2007