A week before the 1967 Abortion Act came into force, GPs were worried.
Some doubted there were enough gynae beds to cope and some GPs outside London feared patients would have to go to the capital as local consultants refused to carry out the procedure. Some even doubted the Act would reduce legal abortions - while others had moral objections. But there was also a debate about NHS priorities.
This was before free contraception and one GP asked: 'Should we really be making abortion freee and birth control expensive?' It was another six years before the NHS provided free contraception.
