Melissa Smith, a pupil at Brunts School in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, had a termination after talking to a 21-year-old health outreach worker with the local primary care trust.
Melissa's mother waived her daughter's right to anonymity by telling the media she was appalled not to have been consulted.
But the 1985 Gillick ruling, when Catholic mother Victoria Gillick lost a legal battle to ensure parents had a right to know when their daughter wanted contraceptive advice, enshrined a child's right to confidentiality.
Both the Department of Health, in its guidelines to health workers, and the Department for Education and Skills, in its guidelines to schools on formulating sex and relationship policies, urge schools to encourage pregnant schoolgirls to tell their parents. But the Gillick ruling means they can't be forced.
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