"It is to be hoped, and we need to ensure, that this review -- consultation -- will properly and fairly highlight safety concerns around the taking of 'at-home abortion pills' which have been highlighted in recent press reports," she said.
The government announced in March that women would be allowed to perform medical abortions at home until the coronavirus crisis ends. In May, it was reported that police were investigating a case in which a mother took home abortion pills while 28 weeks pregnant, four weeks past the legal abortion time limit.
The British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), which oversees the "pills by post" service, reportedly confirmed that it was looking into the case, along with eight others in which women were beyond the 10-week limit for medical abortions at home.
Commenting on Monday's vote, Carla Lockhart, the Democratic Unionist Party MP for Upper Bann, told CNA: "I am delighted that the majority of MPs voted against this abhorrent legislation being implemented in GB. It shows how low the anti-life brigade will stoop to attempt to hijack a very worthy bill on domestic abuse.
"I make no apology for being a pro-life MP, I used my maiden speech to champion this cause, and will continue to give a voice to the voiceless in this Parliament."
Dr Helen Watt, senior research fellow at the Anscombe Bioethics Centre in Oxford, told CNA July 6 that it was "a huge relief" that neither of the two amendments were incorporated into the Domestic Abuse Bill.
She said: "For years, the abortion lobby has been pushing for home abortions, and COVID-19 provided the pretext to introduce them. Already, this temporary permission has led to on-the-ground use of abortion pills far beyond the 'right' gestation: in a harrowing recent case, one baby killed by home abortion was stillborn at 28 weeks."
"It would be unconscionable to entrench permanently home abortions for genuine abuse cases, not least as abusive environments are precisely those in which coercion to abort is most likely, while such coercion is clearly harder to detect remotely."
Watt added that women who were not being abused might be tempted to claim that they were in order to gain access to the pills.
"Checking the facts here is no easier than checking for coercion, gestational age or possible ectopic pregnancy," she said.
"Home abortions are not only lethal to the baby but carry real harms and risks for the mother: women with crisis pregnancies need swift in-person help, not remote, abortion-focused consultations."
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Ahead of Monday's House of Commons debate, an English bishop urged Catholics to contact their MPs to express their concern about the amendments. Bishop John Sherrington said that the proposals would "leave the U.K. with the most extreme abortion legislation in Europe."
He said: "This is being presented as decriminalizing abortion but it would, if carried, do far more than that. It would result in the introduction of abortion on demand, for any reason, up until when a child is capable of being born alive, with a ceiling of 28 weeks."
"It would leave the U.K. with the most extreme abortion legislation in Europe, where in nearly all countries the time limit for abortion is 12 weeks. The majority of our fellow citizens would like to see the current 24-week limit reduced, not increased."
Last month official figures revealed that a record number of abortions took place in England and Wales in 2019.
The government said June 11 that a total of 209,519 abortions took place last year, more than in any other year since the practice was legalized by the Abortion Act 1967.
Catherine Robinson, spokesperson for the charitable organization Right to Life UK, said: "This is a major victory for the unborn child and women facing unplanned pregnancies. These amendments would have left the unborn child with considerably worse protections and removed many of the current safeguards which protect women facing unplanned pregnancies."