Ask Your GP

ASK YOUR GP is a campaign to encourage GPs in Australia to consider providing early medication abortion. It is sponsored by Children by Choice and the South Australian Abortion Action Coalition (saaac).

Next time you visit a GP you can ask them ‘For future reference, do you provide early medication abortion?’ People of all genders, of all ages, regardless of whether or not they can become pregnant, can ask this question as a way of bringing the issue to the GP’s attention.

Abortion is legal in all Australian states and territories and we can all help promote abortion access in our local area.

Early medication abortion is the use of medicines to end an early pregnancy. In Australia, the medicines used for this (mifepristone and misoprostol) are licensed by the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) and marketed as MS 2-Step. In 2023 the TGA made it a lot simpler for GPs to prescribe these medicines. Medication abortion is generally available in Australia for terminations of pregnancies less than nine weeks gestation and can be provided by telehealth.

Australian research tells us that patients who have an early medication abortion are satisfied with the experience.

But not enough GPs are currently offering early medication abortion as part of their practice. Reasons for this vary, but information, support and training for health care providers is available from MSHealth, who distribute the medicines https://www.mshealth.com.au/products/.

For more information on becoming a MToP provider visit AusCAPPS Network Community of Practice, an Australian Contraception and Abortion Primary Care Practitioners Support Network.

If you are interested in research relating to medication abortion and GP provision, please check out these links,

https://srh.bmj.com/content/48/2/103.abstract

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0010782419304974