Govt ‘secrecy’ around adverse abortion outcomes ‘beggars belief’

Independent TD Carol Nolan has criticised out at Government secrecy regarding post-abortion care, questioning the absence of a national data collection mechanism.

Ms Nolan was frustrated with the Health Minister’s response to a question regarding the number of patients who received post-abortion care in maternity hospitals from January 2019 to present.

“It almost beggars belief that nearly three years on from the enactment of the 2018 abortion legislation, the Department of Health still has no mechanisms or national data collection methods in place regarding post abortion care,” she told The Irish Catholic.

Ms Nolan continued, saying that she believed the absence of the database is not accidental.

“My own sense is that this is a calculated attempt to continue shrouding adverse abortion outcomes in secrecy,” she said. “This is profoundly disturbing as the department has itself recognised that the collation of such data is necessary for ‘quality assurance purposes’.

Women deserve the fullest possible degree of information regarding abortion outcomes, Ms Nolan argued.

“Unfortunately, there is little evidence to date that either the Minister or the HSE share this view,” she continued. “If we do not have access to national data on adverse or dangerous outcomes, then the field is left wide open for abortion advocates to continue touting the view that abortion is a ‘safe’ and harmless procedure.”

Meanwhile, the couple at the centre of the tragic abortion case at the National Maternity Hospital in Holles Street have personally written to Taoiseach Micheál Martin outlining their distress that a review of the case is still unable to get under way.

The couple were told in March last year, after two tests, that their much-wanted unborn baby had a fatal foetal abnormality and would not survive.

They decided to abort the child, but were left distraught when a more advanced test later showed the baby was healthy.