Half of women presenting for abortion were already mothers, says report

Half of women presenting for abortion were already mothers, says report

Almost half the women presenting for early abortion services at a family planning clinic were already mothers, according to the clinic’s report.

The Irish Family Planning Association’s (IFPA) 2019 annual report, which covers the first year of abortion services, analysed data from 177 clients for insight into who is having abortions.

The IFPA report states that they had 1,015 “early medical abortion” appointments, which are appointments for abortions within nine weeks and administered by pills.

Just more than half of the women were in their 20s, 34% were in their 30s, 8% were younger than 20 and 7% were aged 40 or over.

A third of the women were using contraception when they became pregnant.

Those who had passed nine weeks were referred to hospitals or to English clinics if they were outside the legal gestational limit of 12 weeks.

Around 5% of women who were given the abortion pill by the IFPA experienced complications and were referred to hospital for treatment.