Content warning: Please proceed with caution if this topic may be upsetting for you. There is a list of support organisations at the end of the page if you are affected by any of these experiences.

Abortion takes place when the pregnant person chooses to end the pregnancy. This can be, for example, because they do not feel equipped to raise a child, or for medical reasons (for example if the foetus has a life-limiting condition or the pregnancy poses a significant threat to the gestational parent’s health). Abortions are extremely common: some 73 million take place worldwide annually (Bearak et al., 2020) and, in 2021, there were 214,256 abortions in England and Wales (Office of Health Improvement and Disparities, 2023). Except for the work done by Fiona Bloomer and colleagues (2017, 2023), in the Northern Irish context, little is known about abortion in UK workplace contexts.

Abortion is also highly stigmatised and is often seen as an ethical rather than a healthcare issue. This can create substantial difficulties for those who choose to end their pregnancy, and has even led to the repealing of Roe v Wade which simultaneously ended 50 years of abortion rights in the US.  

Our Early Pregnancy Endings and the Workplace project is one of the few studies that explore the experiences of people in paid employment in the UK who have had an abortion in the first six months of pregnancy, as well as those who have had other forms of pregnancy endings like a miscarriage or molar pregnancy (where the fertilised egg does not develop properly). We ran a survey during 2022, attracting 226 respondents, 39 of whom had had abortions.

What stood out from our survey data was that abortions were especially challenging to navigate alongside paid work. For example, only 55% of our respondents in this group had told anyone at work about their abortion, whereas 72.5% of those who experienced a miscarriage disclosed this to colleagues.

Just 44.1% of those who did disclose their abortion said the person they told was supportive and helpful, compared to 61.8% of those who had had a miscarriage. Even more starkly, 44.1% of those who disclosed their abortion had no response at all, against 27.7% of respondents who had miscarried. Equally, when respondents who had abortions took time off from work as a result, this was typically for a much shorter period of time.

Our interpretation of these findings is that pregnancy endings are stigmatised, or felt to be stigmatised, in UK workplaces and abortions are even more stigmatised, just as they are in wider society. As one of our survey respondents told us:

On the basis of our survey findings, we make a number of recommendations to workplaces for improved support for those experiencing any form of pregnancy ending (including abortion and miscarriage). These include:

• Awareness training and education for employees, line managers and HR professionals alike is needed around all forms of pregnancy endings so that these experiences are no longer silenced. Where such information is readily available, this signals an inclusive organisational culture and helps to destigmatise abortion/termination.
• Any policy or support mechanism in this area should include psychological wellbeing as well as physical health.
• Policies should be evidence-based, developed in consultation with employees, shared widely and regularly updated. Some staff will need reasonable adjustments after a pregnancy ends, including flexible work patterns, as well as or instead of time off. 
• There is no one-size-fits-all experience of pregnancy endings, no matter how long the pregnancy has lasted or whether the ending was spontaneous (as in miscarriage) or chosen (as in abortion/termination). No assumptions should be made about how the gestational parent – or indeed the partner of that parent – is feeling.
• Organisations should also ensure that the support they offer in this area is available to all staff across all pregnancy endings, regardless of gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, age or religion. However, disclosure of such an ending at work should always be the choice of the person affected.