Abortion ‘is no treatment for suicidal tendencies’

Abortion is not a treatment for suicidal tendencies and there are no statistics on women threatening to kill themselves who do not want a pregnancy, a leading psychologists told an Oireachtas committee.

The second day of hearings into the Government’s planned abortion legislation yesterday heard from psychiatrists and other specialists.

Consultant perinatal psychiatrist Anthony McCarthy told the Oireachtas Health Committee abortion was never a treatment for suicide. However, Dr McCarthy, president of the College of Psychiatrists of Ireland, said the nation had been ignoring the issue of abortion for too long.