The NHS is spending around £1 million of taxpayers’ money each week on abortions for women who have already chosen to end one or more pregnancy.
Critics warn that many women view abortion as just another form of contraception.
Official figures show that thousands of women are having more than one abortion, with some having up to nine.
Abortions
In 2010, the last year for which figures are available, 189,574 abortions took place in England and Wales.
More than 64,000 of these abortions were performed on someone who had already opted to end a pregnancy. Over 50,000 of them were unmarried.
Josephine Quintavalle, of the Pro-Life Alliance, described the number of repeat abortions taking place as “simply extraordinary”.
Harrowing
She said: “Abortion is an unpleasant and harrowing experience for women and to hear it is happening repeatedly makes your hair stand on end. These figures show that sadly, abortion is being seen by many as a form of contraception.
“But is this surprising when we live in a society which says it’s all right to have an abortion once. If it’s fine once, why not two, three or four times.”
And Stuart Cowie, a spokesman for pressure group LIFE, said: “These figures show that ‘no questions asked’ abortion on demand trivialises the process so much that it is no longer seen as the last resort.”
Difficult
Each abortion is reported to cost the NHS up to £1,000.
The statistics were released by the Department of Health in response to a Parliamentary question by Labour MP Diane Abbott.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Health said: “Having an abortion can be a very difficult and traumatic experience.
Sex
“There is no evidence that women are using abortion as a method of birth control – abortion rates have increased only slightly in the last ten years.”
In February an undercover investigation by The Daily Telegraph revealed that women are being granted abortions after telling doctors their baby is the ‘wrong sex’.