§ Mrs. Ann WintertonTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what information she has concerning the average cost of a national health service abortion performed(a) in a national health service hospital and (b) in a private clinic under agency arrangements.
§ Mr. SackvilleThe estimated average cost of a surgical abortion in a national health service hospital is £270 for a90W straightforward in-patient case and 140 for a day case (at 1990–91 figures). Some two thirds of abortions performed in national health service hospitals are carried out on a day case basis (i.e. the patient does not stay overnight). No information is held centrally about the cost of abortions performed in the private sector under agency arrangements.
§ Mrs. Ann WintertonTo ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what has been the total number of abortions performed under the terms of the Abortion Act 1967; how many of these were performed in national health service hospitals; and what was the total estimated cost at current prices;
(2) how many of the total number of abortions so far performed under the Abortion Act 1967 were performed in private clinics under national health service agency arrangements; and what was the total cost of those abortions at current prices.
§ Mr. SackvilleOf the 3,546,681 abortions performed in England and Wales since the Abortion Act 1967 came into effect, and up to 31 December 1991, 1,387,829 were performed in national health service hospitals. Since 1981, when information was first collected about agency arrangements between NHS authorities and the private sector, a total of 74,680 abortions have been so provided. The total cost of these is not known centrally. Information is not available centrally to enable the total cost of all abortions to be estimated.
§ Mrs. Ann WintertonTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what information she has concerning the average cost to patients of abortions performed in private abortion clinics; and how many such abortions in total have now been performed under the provisions of the Abortion Act 1967.
§ Mr. SackvilleThe total number of abortions performed in private abortion clinics and hospitals under the Abortion Act 1967 since it came into effect, and up to 31 December 1991, is 2,158,852. We do not collect centrally information about fees charged by all private clinics.
§ Mrs. Ann WintertonTo ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will indicate, without revealing the names of the doctors concerned, how many and what percentage of all abortions on babies of 18 or more weeks gestation in the latest year for which figures are available were carried out by each of the 10 doctors who have performed the greatest number of such abortions.
§ Mr. SackvilleThis information is available only from the abortion notification forms submitted to the Chief Medical Officer under regulation 4 of the Abortion Regulations 1991, and cannot be disclosed because of restrictions set out in regulation 5.