Dundee has highest rate of abortion for third year

Five-year high of 12,212 terminations in Scotland, with dozens of women using medication at home

Dundee has the highest abortion rate in the country for the third year in a row, official figures show.

An NHS report also reveals that dozens of women in Scotland terminated a pregnancy using medication at home in the two months after a change to the law.

There was a five-year high of 12,212 abortions in Scotland in 2017, according to Scottish Government data published yesterday. In Dundee, there were 561 terminations last year – 17.3 for every 100,000 females aged 15-44, compared with the national figure of 11.8.

A legal change in October 27 allowed women to take the drug misoprostol to end pregnancies in their own home.

A total of 58 women did so between then and the end of the year, according to the Termination of Pregnancy report from NHS Scotland.

A spokesman for the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children Scotland said the figures are “deeply alarming”.

“They show a rising trend that indicates a failure to provide the support women need in pregnancy,” the spokesman said. “The figures also show us that in the past six months, 58 women have opted to have a ‘DIY’ abortion. Such terminations are both physically and mentally dangerous to expectant mothers, and a tragic new dimension to our abortion culture.”

Pro-choice campaigners Abortion Rights said the legal change was a “progressive move and one which is in line with modern medicine”.

Speaking at the time, Jillian Merchant, a Glasgow solicitor and vicechairman of the group, said: “It will end the horrendous experience of abortions commencing on public transport due to outdated legislation, which takes no account of medical advances or the reality of women’s lives.”

NHS Tayside is one of four health boards that failed to meet a government target that 70% of terminations are performed within nine weeks gestation, falling just short at 69.1%.

Across Scotland, the target for 70% of women requiring abortions to have the procedure while less than nine weeks pregnant was exceeded, at 72.1%.

The figures also showed that termination rates in the most deprived areas remain almost double those in the most affluent neighbourhoods, at 16.2 per 1,000 women aged 15-44, compared with 8.2.

Girls under 16 had the lowest rate of abortions for the fourth year running, at 1.3 per 1,000 women aged 13-15.

A rising trend that indicates a failure to provide the support women need in pregnancy