Opposition TDs and campaigners are calling on Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly to outlaw pro-life adverts outside GP practices and hospitals as part of abortion-exclusion zones legislation.

It comes as The Life Institute and The Iona Institute launched a billboard campaign in Dublin, Cork, Galway and other parts of the country marking the “disturbing rise in the number of abortions”.

Social Democrat TD Holly Cairns said the current billboard campaign contains “misleading” information, but said that “there is nothing at the moment to stop groups putting these adverts up where they like”.

She accused pro-life campaigners of “targeting” hospitals and GP clinics where women go for treatment, calling it “a deliberate tactic”.

“We have seen it with those grotesque physical protests that happen outside hospitals and we have been waiting for legislation to create safe zones outside hospitals since 2018.”

“That safe zone legislation could also include billboards like this,” she said.