Dr. Caitriona Henchion:

That is again an availability issue. Many people assume that when somebody is in that nine-to-12 week bracket and gets referred to hospital that she automatically gets the option of a surgical abortion. That is not the case. It depends on what location she is referred to. Some maternity units that are providing services do not actually have access to provide surgical abortion. It can be particularly problematic for women, let us say, who have had a very difficult experience, either with a previous medical abortion or maybe a miscarriage, and are very anxious about the procedure or, again, are very worried about the prospect of failure, which would be higher with medical rather than surgical abortion.

The other issue I want to address relates to that of the youthfulness of the three days in respect of women potentially changing their minds. A significant amount of evidence shows there is no medical basis for the three days' wait. It is not just the fact of having a waiting period. It is the fact the waiting period is mandated in law to a specific length of time that is totally inflexible and does not take anything into account regarding a woman's circumstances. As I said, these things relate to the availability of referral services and the fact that in certain cases three days means at least a week because, for example, there might not be another hospital clinic until the end of that week. It may also be the fact that a woman, for example, only has support from a partner at weekends so, again, three days becomes seven days since she cannot come back for the appointment on a Monday or Tuesday because there is nobody to mind her children. It is all of those things. It is the inflexibility of it, apart from the principle of it, that is problematic.

This issue should also come under the general principles of good, informed consent. If we get such consent, somebody who is uncertain should then feel comfortable in saying "I don't know". My experience is that those people do say "I don't know", and when they are given the information, they very clearly say, "I am still not quite sure what I'm going to do". I say to them that it is absolutely fine if they need more time, that if they are six or seven weeks pregnant, for example, they have more time, they do not have to come after three days, they can come next week or the end of next week and, if it runs a bit longer, we can refer them to hospital. We go through all of that with people. They do not need to be told they must wait. It is up to good practitioners to make sure that if people need to wait, they get that opportunity. It is not for the law to decide how long it should be for a woman to decide she is still sure about the decision she was already sure about three days ago.