Statement in response to the jailing of a woman for 28 months for taking abortion pills

It is an absolute disgrace that in the UK today a woman has been sentenced to 28 months in prison for procuring her own abortion. UK abortion law is woefully outdated, shameful and dangerous. It impacts access, prevents provision of best care and infantilises and stigmatises women. It also hangs the threat of prosecution over those who access abortion care as well as the health professionals who provide it, a very real threat as evidenced by the tragic outcome today. We desperately need urgent change so that no other pregnant person or their families can be harmed by these draconian laws and no woman will ever again face time in jail for ending their own pregnancy. Doctors for Choice UK are supporting calls for abortion law reform and believe that abortion should be decriminalised, removed from the criminal statute and treated as the essential healthcare that it is.

The march

Doctors for Choice UK also joined thousands who marched from the Royal Courts of Justice to Westminster on the 17th June to protest against the unjust criminalisation of a woman via an archaic law who took pills to end her own pregnancy, and to call for decriminalisation of abortion in the UK.