Pregnancy counselling and regulation

A chara, – After listening with mounting horror to the details of the "advice" from a so-called crisis pregnancy advice clinic, I was horrified to read that Minister for Children Katherine Zappone was merely "considering" regulation of these clinics and that Minister for Health Simon Harris and the HSE are powerless to regulate or prosecute, and must instead compete with these unsupervised agencies ("'Every option' promised to ensure reliable pregnancy counselling", September 5th).

I hope it would be agreed by everyone that people in such vulnerable situations deserve accurate and unbiased information, and that the provision of blatantly false and harmful advice is unacceptable and reprehensible in the extreme. The time for acceptance of this inaction is long since passed, and these departments must act now to stop others from suffering. – Is mise,

Dr MARK O’LOUGHLIN,

Clinical Lecturer,

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Registrar in Histopathology,

Galway University Hospital.