WMA Resolution on Anti-LGBTQ Legislation
Adopted by the 223rd WMA Council Session, Nairobi, Kenya, April 2023
Revised and adopted by the 74th WMA General Assembly, Kigali, Rwanda, October 2023
Revised as Council Resolution by the 226th WMA Council Session, Seoul, Korea, April 2024 and
adopted by the 75th WMA General Assembly, Helsinki, Finland, October 2024
PREAMBLE
The WMA is gravely concerned about the “Anti-Homosexuality law” that was passed in the Ugandan parliament on March 21, 2023, and signed into law by Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni in May 2023. The WMA originally condemned the bill in a press release issued on March 24, 2023.
While the Uganda Constitutional Court did strike down sections of the law that restricted healthcare access for LGBT people, criminalised renting premises to LGBT people, and an obligation to report alleged acts of homosexuality, on April 3, 2024, the court upheld the abusive and radical provisions of the Anti-Homosexuality Act, including sections which criminalise certain consensual same-sex acts and makes them punishable by death or life imprisonment. A provision on the “promotion” of homosexuality is also of grave concern, exposing anyone who “knowingly promotes homosexuality” to as much as twenty years in prison.
Similarly, an “Anti-Gay” bill was passed by the parliament of Ghana on February 28, 2024. The bill has its origins in British colonial law which criminalizes “unnatural sex”, and broadens the scope of criminal sanctions against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, transsexual, and pansexual people, including their allies.
The so-called “Human Sexual Rights and Family Values” bill also allows for criminalizing medical professionals’ work. The bill prohibits the provision of or participation in the provision of surgical procedures for sex or gender reassignment, as punishable by fines or imprisonment. Distribution and other broadcast of any information that promote activities that are prohibited under bill, including teaching children any gender or sex beyond male and female, could result in 10 years imprisonment. The bill would also require anyone with knowledge of prohibited activities to report these activities to the police or other authorities.
In July 2024, the Ghana Supreme Court upheld the bill. Ugandan President Nana Akufo-Addo has not yet signed the bill into law.
Similar troubling legislation and laws have arisen in countries including but not limited to Georgia, the United States, Bulgaria and Iraq.
These kinds of laws and bills challenge the role of physicians to objectively provide information to patients and, where appropriate, those close to them. Physicians could face disciplinary action or retribution for pointing out in the context of treatment that homosexuality is a natural variation of human sexuality. This can impact the professional practice of a physician, as can be seen in other countries that have implemented similar legislation. It can also impact the health of individuals and the population as a whole if patients of the LGBTQ+ community are fearful of accessing healthcare or of being forthcoming with information when they require medical care.
As stated in its Statement on Natural Variations of Human Sexuality and supported in its Statement on Transgender People, the WMA condemns all forms of stigmatisation, criminalization of and discrimination against people based on their sexual orientation.
The WMA reasserts that being lesbian, gay, or bisexual are natural variations within the range of human sexuality and that discrimination, both interpersonally and at the institutional level, anti-homosexual or anti-bisexual legislation and human rights violations, stigmatisation, criminalization of same-sex partnerships, peer rejection and bullying continue to have a serious impact upon the psychological and physical health of lesbian, gay or bisexual people.
Further, the WMA emphasises that everyone has the right to determine one’s own gender, recognises the diversity of possibilities in this respect and calls for appropriate legal measures to protect the equal civil rights of transgender people.
RECOMMENDATIONS
Therefore, the WMA, reaffirming its statements on Natural Variations of Human Sexuality and Transgender People, calls on:
- Ugandan authorities to immediately repeal the Anti-Homosexuality law in its entirety;
- Ghanaian authorities to immediately veto or rescind the Human Sexual Rights and Family Values bill; and
- WMA Constituent members to condemn the Ugandan law and Ghanaian bill, and advocate against any similar legislation that is proposed or enacted.