Abortion
(asked on 27th November 2017) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many abortions were performed under the Abortion Act 1967 as amended by s.37 of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990 in cases where the unborn child had a cleft (a) palate and (b) lip by (i) grounds of abortion, (ii) length of gestation and (iii) relevant health authority in each of the last 15 years.
Data on cleft palate and cleft lip are not identifiable separately within the abortion statistics. Information on the combined number of legal abortions under Ground E for primary medical reason of cleft lip and palate, by gestation, for residents of England and Wales is set out in the following table:
| Cleft lip and Cleft palate | |
Year | All gestations | Gestation 24 weeks and above |
2002 | 2 | 0 |
2003 | 6 | 0 |
2004 | 3 | 0 |
2005 | 5 | 1 |
2006 | 2 | 0 |
2007 | 0 | 0 |
2008 | 2 | 0 |
2009 | 3 | 0 |
2010 | 7 | 0 |
2011 | 4 | 0 |
2012 | 4 | 0 |
2013 | 9 | 0 |
2014 | 10 | 0 |
2015 | 11 | 0 |
2016 | 9 | 0 |
The Department holds abortion data by clinical commissioning group (CCG) and local authority (LA), rather than by Health Authority. Data for cleft lip and palate has not been released broken down by either CCG or LA due to the disclosive nature of the data as there are small numbers in each area.