Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Merron on 27 November 2025 (HL12262), why annual totals of reports they have received via the HSA4 abortion notification form of women who have died within 14 days of taking at-home abortion medication prescribed by the British Pregnancy Advisory Service would risk the identification of individual patients; and how many of those reports they have received in total in the past four years.

Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department continues to review the release of abortion statistics, to ensure the trustworthiness, quality, and value of these statistics, and also to mitigate the disclosure of sensitive information. Following the 2023 abortion statistics publication, all data is rounded to the nearest five. This aligns with the Code of Practice for Statistics and enables the Department to release more detailed information to the public.

We apply Statistical Disclosure Control with the aim to prevent the release of data that could identify individuals. This is particularly important when counts are low or zero, as small numbers increase the risk of disclosure. As a result of this change, counts of zero can mean no or a small number of procedures in the given field.

From 2020 to 2023, the number of deaths recorded via the HSA4 form for abortions where either one or both abortion medications were administered at home and had been prescribed by the British Pregnancy Advisory Service was zero, rounded to the nearest multiple of five. Please note that this is the number of cases recorded in the statistical datasets used for publication, which are a snapshot of the data at the time it was compiled, and therefore will not include late submissions or changes.

Found: Faulkner of Worcester;; Baroness Janke; Lord Mawson; Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer; Lord Porter of Spalding