The German health minister, Jens Spahn, has said that he will seek to ban “conversion therapies” that claim to change sexual orientation. “Homosexuality is not an illness, which is why it does not need to be treated,” Spahn, who is gay himself, told the left-leaning Berlin daily Die Tageszeitung.
He hoped that a German law banning such therapies could be adopted by the summer.
Conversion therapy – sometimes referred to as “cure” therapy, reparative therapy, ex-gay therapy or sexual-orientation change efforts – refers to any treatment aiming to change a person’s sexual orientation or suppress their gender identity. They have spread across the United States and have been used by parents of homosexual or transgender adolescents against their will.
Most such practices depend on talking therapy, but some techniques involve injections of large doses of testosterone, electric shocks, and other treatments.
“I do not believe in these therapies, mainly owing to my own homosexuality,” said Spahn, who represents the right wing of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative CDU party.
The health minister is counting on support from his colleagues if and when a vote is taken. “I cannot imagine there is a partisan of conversion therapies in my parliamentary group,” he said.
Within the EU, only Malta and some Spanish regions have banned the practice outright. In March 2018, a large majority of European parliament deputies nonetheless adopted a non-binding text that called on member states to outlaw them.