Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Markham on 15 May (HL4224), how they reconcile the answer with that given by the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on 23 November 2023 (HC527), which precluded the ability of a medical practitioner to form a "good faith" opinion through a telemedicine consultation alone that the patient's gestation was below 10 weeks, and therefore to dispense early medical abortion pills for use by the patient at home.

The response of 23 November 2023 does not preclude the ability of a medical practitioner to form a good faith opinion, through a telemedicine consultation alone, that the patient's gestation was below 10 weeks. This opinion can be formed either during a teleconsultation, or an in-person appointment.

Pregnancy duration can be assessed from the first day of the last menstrual period (LMP). Advice from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists is clear that most women can determine the duration of their pregnancy with reasonable accuracy by LMP alone.

However, if there is any uncertainty about the gestation of the pregnancy, the medical practitioner would ask the woman to attend an in-person appointment to enable them to form an opinion that the pregnancy will not have exceeded 10 weeks at the time the first abortion pill is taken. If she does not attend in-person when requested, the terminating practitioner would not be able to form an opinion in good faith that the pregnancy is below 10 weeks gestation, and therefore would not be able to prescribe abortion pills for home use.