Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that the provision of pills for home abortions is controlled to prevent those pills from being (a) supplied for sale and (b) to people who are in the later stages of an abortion and for whom the pills are not suitable.

The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists has issued clinical guidelines for healthcare professionals called ‘Coronavirus infection and abortion care’. The guidance sets out the circumstances where women should be asked to attend a clinic for an ultra-sound scan. However it states that “most women can determine the gestational age of their pregnancy with reasonable accuracy by last menstrual period (LMP) alone”. The guidance includes a decision aid for clinicians to use to help determine if an ultra-sound scan is required. This includes detailed questions to identify gestational age.

The best way to assure the safety of medicines is for the clinic to supply medicines obtained through the regulated supply chain, appropriately labelled for individual patients to be safely used only by those patients. The pills are only supplied following a robust consultation.