Duluth is the latest Minnesota city to consider banning conversion therapy for minors (WCCO story).
MAFP Legislative Committee co-chair and Duluthian Jamie Conniff, MD, MPH, testified before the Duluth City Council in support of the proposed ordinance, this past Monday, December 9.
The Council is expected to vote on the ordinance next week.
Excerpt from Conniff’s Powerful Testimony:
“I want to be clear about three things:
1. No scientific study has ever suggested that any therapy can alter a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity.
2. There is consensus among healthcare professional organizations that conversion therapy is coercive, unethical and harmful.
3. Most important: there is nothing about my sexuality, about my marriage or about my patients’ gender identities that is diseased, disordered or anything other than part of the normal, rich diversity of human experience.
In the two decades that have passed since I first came out, our society has made phenomenal progress in the ways we accept and celebrate diversity of all kinds. And yet, even in today’s climate, I see my young patients struggling against the message that something is wrong with them. That message is even more damaging when it’s delivered by a healthcare professional, licensed by the state of Minnesota and reimbursed by health insurance.My patients don’t deserve that. They deserve to be loved. And, they deserve to live in a community that takes proactive steps to make sure that no licensed professional can defraud families and harm young people with a practice designed to cure them of who they are. I encourage you to pass this ordinance in order to protect and promote the well-being of Duluth’s young people.”
Take Action
Reach out to the Duluth City Council ahead of next week’s vote and tell them to pass this ordinance to ban conversion therapy for minors.