Jacob Rees-Mogg is right – the morning-after pill can cause abortions

Boots recently announced a cut to the price of the morning-after pill (MAP) to £10. This pill has been around for decades. It was first licensed in the UK in the 1980s for occasional use. However, today it can legally be handed out without prescription, and even in schools to children under the age of consent.

The MAP is often dubbed ‘emergency contraception’. And so there was outrage from the pro-abortion lobby this month when the then Leader of the House of Commons Jacob Rees-Mogg described the drugs as abortifacient, i.e. they cause abortion.

the reality is that the MAP can cause abortions

Dame Diana Johnson MP said Mr Rees-Mogg’s words were a “harmful clinical falsehood”. But despite this claim, and the vociferous rhetoric from pro-abortionists, the reality is that the MAP can cause abortions. The pills contain high doses of progesterone which can prevent ovulation and inhibit sperm from fertilising the egg if it has been released. But if fertilisation has occurred, the MAP can also thin the lining of the womb, meaning that the embryo cannot implant, destroying a life that has already begun. Although this post-fertilisation mode of action is strongly disputed today, it was openly acknowledged when the MAP was first introduced. Mainstream media and the Government of the day all admitted (page 27) that the MAP acted to prevent implantation. Even the FPA (previously the Family Planning Association) only stopped acknowledging this in 2020.

So why the calls for Rees-Mogg to correct himself?

Activists have subtly changed the meaning of the word ‘conception’ so that it fits their narrative. Discarding long-established scientific fact, no longer does conception occur when the sperm fertilises the egg, but when the embryo implants in the lining of the womb. In this new biology, there is no conception, no pregnancy, and therefore no baby, until implantation (around day six), and enabling the MAP to slip in under the guise of contraception.

All this allows abortion groups to say that the MAP “won’t harm an existing pregnancy”.

Bioethicist Dr John Ling sums up the issue: “This is another example of lexical engineering preceding social engineering – we should not be fooled.”