Geneva, 26 February 2020 – A ground-breaking report released today by ILGA World has exposed how - thanks to the tireless advocacy of activists, survivors and grassroots organisations - States and health professionals across the world are speaking up against so-called ‘conversion therapies’. Their joint efforts are crucial to protect people from a myriad of pseudo-scientific practices that continue to have a destructive effect on people’s lives from a very early age.
Curbing deception - A world survey of legal restrictions of so-called ‘conversion therapies’ is an extensive global research into laws banning these discredited practices both at the national and subnational level.
The report also explores the vast field of techniques that have been used in the past—and continue to be used today—for the purpose of attempting to alter lesbians, gays and bisexuals’ sexual orientation, to prevent trans youth from transitioning or make trans people de-transition, or to force our gender expressions and roles to align with the social binary stereotypes of masculinity and femininity.
Download the ILGA World report
Curbing deception - A world survey of legal restrictions
of so-called ‘conversion therapies’ in English – in Spanish
Note: survivors of these practices may find certain parts of this report distressing
“As of February 2020, three UN member States (Brazil, Ecuador and Malta) have enacted nationwide laws to restrict so-called ‘conversion therapies’”, explains Lucas Ramón Mendos, Senior Research Officer at ILGA World and author of the report. “Subnational jurisdictions in three more UN member States (Canada, Spain and the United States) have done the same, hopefully paving the way for others to move in the same direction. For too long, experimentation and abuse has taken place under the legitimising cloak of medicine, psychology and science”.
Throughout the 20th century, mental health practitioners resorted to medical experimentation, lobotomy, castration, masturbatory reconditioning, chemical and electroshock aversion therapy, hypnosis and other brutal and inhumane techniques in their attempts to modify sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression.
Key figures (as of February 2020):
3 UN member States (Brazil, Ecuador and Malta) have enacted nationwide laws to restrict so-called ‘conversion therapies’
in other 3 UN member States, subnational jurisdictions have enacted bans or restrictions on these practices: Canada (3 provinces and several cities), Spain (5 regions) and the United States of America (19 states, Washington DC, Puerto Rico and numerous cities and counties)
in 5 UN member States (Argentina, Uruguay, Fiji, Nauru and Samoa), mental health laws prohibit diagnosing patients exclusively on the basis of sexual orientation and/or gender identity: these laws act as indirect bans
10 countries have introduced bills in national legislative bodies to restrict these practices. In several other countries - including Australia, Canada, Mexico, and the United States - sub-national jurisdictions continue to discuss these bills
At least 6 court cases have been litigated in 3 different countries with positive results
The World Health Organization (WHO), the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the World Medical Association and the World Psychiatric Association—as well as more than 60 health professional associations spread across more than 20 countries - have repudiated efforts to change a person’s gender identity, gender expression or sexual orientation.