On Monday, Fairfax Media revealed a service called the Tabbot Foundation would prescribe mifepristone and misoprostol (commonly known as RU486) for women who are suitable for a medical abortion and are assessed via telephone consultation.

The service has since received enquiries from four times the number of people it is able to treat, and is now trying to find alternative services for some women.

The World Health Organisation categorises mifepristone and misoprostol as "essential medicines" that all women should have access to, but in Australia it can be extremely difficult to obtain and costly.

Reproductive Choice Australia co-president Jenny Ejlak said the number of calls to the Tabbot Foundation "should be a wake-up call" for governments, which had failed to properly plan to provide abortion services and also to ensure proper strategies were put in place to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the first place.

"Safe and accessible pregnancy termination services are essential health services and should be planned for in the same way as locating hospitals and community health centres," she said.

There was also an urgent need for a national reproductive health strategy, to reduce unintended pregnancies and ensure the best care for women experiencing fertility issues, which had been called for by "every major health body in Australia" but to no avail.

"There are a number of highly effective, evidence-based strategies to reduce the rate of unintended pregnancy but federal and state and territory governments consistently fail to act," she said.

Australia has a far higher rate of teenage pregnancies than many other developed nations – about 18 births for every 1000 women aged between 15 and 19, compared with 4.6 in Japan and 5.5 in Switzerland.

Tabbot Foundation medical director Paul Hyland said since Fairfax reported its launch, its free phone number, 1800 180 880, had received an average of 50 calls a day, while its website had about 1200 hits a day. It had been expecting to treat between eight and 10 new patients a day.

"Unfortunately, this overwhelming demand has outstripped our capacity to provide care to the number of patients requesting it, whilst maintaining the level of professionalism that our service has set," he said.

"Until further notice, in cases where we cannot provide a service to a woman within 48 hours, they will be directed to their closest medical provider, where pregnancy termination services are known to exist."

He said Tabbot would focus on providing its service to women in rural and remote regional areas, who were unable to access abortions any other way.

Another service, Cairns Doctors, can also prescribe the drugs using video consultations done through Skype, but one of the organisation's doctors, Heather McNamee​, said the service was small and was unlikely to be able to meet the excess demand nationally.

She said along with access to pregnancy termination there was also a huge shortage of GPs trained to prescribe and administer long-acting contraceptives, such as the implant Implanon, which lasts for three years.

"We know there is a massive problem with supply," she said. "[Teenage pregnancy] is just destroying young lives in Australia."

Dr McNamee said she preferred to use Skype because she wanted to be able to see the women she consulted with.