Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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Under section 20 (1) of the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018, a notification of each termination of pregnancy carried out under the legislation must be notified to the Minister for Health within 28 days of it being carried out. Section 20, subsections (3) and (4), require the Minister to prepare a report on the notifications received in a given year not later than 30 June the following year and thereafter to lay it before the Houses of the Oireachtas and arrange for its publication.

Termination of Pregnancy (TOP) services are provided free of charge in line with the 2018 Act. GP provision of TOP services is predominantly via the GP contract where GPs are reimbursed via the Primary Care Reimbursement Scheme (PCRS) for the consultations undertaken with patients in respect of terminations (there are two consultations required to carry out a termination in early pregnancy). The Department has engaged with the PCRS in the HSE to cross-check the total number of TOP claims made against the number of statutory notifications received. Figures received from the HSE indicated that approximately 8,844 second consultation claims were made in 2022. Section 20 of the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018 provides a narrow statutory framework for the notification to the Minister of terminations of pregnancy and provides for a limited data collection, ensuring protection of the personal information and identity of people accessing termination of pregnancy services – as such cross analysis of different data sets is challenging.

The Department will continue to engage with the HSE, with a view to remind all service providers of their obligations under section 20 of the 2018 Act.

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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Under Section 20 of the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018, medical practitioners are required to notify the Minister, with prescribed details of a termination of pregnancy.

Under the Act, the Minister is required, not later than 30 June in each year, to prepare a report on the notifications received under section 20 during the immediately preceding year. The Minister is also required, as soon as may be after preparing the report, to cause copies of the report to be laid before each House of the Oireachtas.

The Report for 2021 was published on 13^thJuly and covers the period 1 January 2021 – 31 December 2021. The overall notifications received by the department were substantially lower than observed in previous years, the total number of notifications received in 2021 was 4,577. This is substantially lower than that of 2020 (6,577) and 2019 (6,666). The Department has identified the lower notification numbers, and in the interest of openness and transparency, the Minister for Health has published a supplementary note highlighting the matter, with all of the available information.

In response to the lower number of notifications for 2021, the Department of Health has been engaging on an ongoing basis with the HSE to remind GP’s and hospitals of their obligation to return all notifications for termination of pregnancy as required under the Act.