Shocking new evidence suggests that around 400 baby girls were aborted in the UK between 2017 and 2021 simply because of their sex. Meanwhile, Britain’s largest abortion provider, BPAS, continues to claim the practice is not illegal.
BPAS, which carried out more than 110,000 abortions last year, states on its website: “The law is silent on the [sex-selective abortion] matter. Reason of fetal sex is not a specified ground for abortion within the Abortion Act, but nor is it specifically prohibited.”
However, as Right To Life UK points out, this position directly contradicts the UK Department of Health and Social Care, which has said: “This Government’s position is unequivocal: sex- selective abortion is illegal in England and Wales and will not be tolerated.”
BPAS’s statement on sex-selective abortion follows the publication of a Department of Health and Social Care analysis of sex ratios at birth, which indicated that approximately 400 female unborn babies of Indian ethnicity may have been aborted on the basis of sex over a four year period.
Commenting on the latest controversy, Right To Life UK spokesperson, Catherine Robinson, said: “Even though the Government has said that sex-selective abortion is illegal, the UK’s largest abortion provider, BPAS, which receives the vast majority of its funding from the Government, is telling women that sex-selective abortion is not illegal. This is a shocking contradiction in values from the Government”.
“The Government must act without delay to cut all funding it provides to BPAS, urgently update legislation to introduce an explicit ban on sex-selective abortion, and must not pursue further changes to legislation, such as those proposed in Scotland, that would likely make this problem much worse”.