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June 13 (UPI) -- The head of the British parliament's equalities panel called Tuesday for reform of the country's 162-year-old abortion law after a woman was jailed for taking abortion medication beyond the second-trimester limit. Senior Conservative lawmaker Caroline Nokes said the 1861 Offenses Against the Person law Carla Foster was prosecuted under was "very out of date" and parliament should schedule time to debate overhauling it.
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A judge in Stoke-on-Trent sentenced Foster to 28 months in prison Monday -- of which she will serve 14 -- after she pleaded guilty to taking abortion pills at home during COVID-19 lockdown in 2020 when she was 32 and 34 weeks pregnant. Abortion is legal up to 24 weeks but must be performed in a clinic beyond 10 weeks.
Commons Women and Equalities Committee chair Nokes said MPs should "decide in the 21st Century whether we should be relying on legislation that is centuries old."
"This is not something that has been debated in any great detail for many years now. And cases like this, although tragic and thankfully very rare, throw into sharp relief that we are relying on legislation that is very out of date. It makes a case for parliament to start looking at this issue in detail," said Nokes.
She added that the judge in the case had indicated he believed parliament needed to rethink the country's abortion laws.
Other senior figures made similar calls to decriminalize abortion led by Labor MP Diana Johnson who tried and failed to push through a bill repealing sections of the 1861 act in 2018.
"Society has moved on, healthcare has moved on, and I think parliament has a role now to look at reforming our abortion laws," Johnson told The Guardian.
The former chief prosecutor for the northwest of the country, Nazir Afzal, said if such a case came before him he would not go forward with it because would not be in the public interest.
"Had I been involved, had I been doing this particular case, I would not have prosecuted it," said Afzal who also cited public attitudes to abortion and mitigating circumstances surrounding the case.
Forster already has three children, one of whom is disabled.
In April, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to reverse the Food and Drug Administration's approval of the abortion-inducing pill mifepristone, allowing women continued access to the drug pending the outcome of legal challenges.
The justices rejected rulings by a Texas District Court judge and the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, instead backing the Biden administration's decision not to rescind FDA rules that make the pill widely available.
"The stakes could not be higher for women across America. I will continue to fight politically-driven attacks on women's health," U.S. President Joe Biden said. "But let's be clear -- the American people must continue to use their vote as their voice, and elect a Congress who will pass a law restoring the protections of Roe v. Wade."
The U.S. Supreme Court struck down women's constitutional right to abortion in June 2022.
