France is divided into virginity certificates for girls. Doctors: “It was not correct to ban them”

PARIS – “No to the law that prohibits virginity certificates.” The surprising appeal comes from a group of French gynecologists and doctors who oppose the government’s decision to pass a law banning this sexist and humiliating practice, making doctors who are willing to issue certificates criminally liable. According to the signatories of the text published on Launching The executive’s proposal, which is part of a broader project against “separatism”, particularly Islamic, runs the risk of endangering girls living in integral families.

Virginity certificates are issued after a verification of the integrity of the hymen and are usually requested by young people, or rather parents and future spouses. The undersigned physicians emphasize that it is a minority phenomenon. “We are definitely against virginity tests,” they specify. “It is a barbaric, retrograde and totally sexist practice. In an ideal world, those certificates should naturally be rejected.”

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But then they add: “It turns out that we have to give this certificate to a young woman to save her life, to protect her because she is weakened, vulnerable or threatened.” According to the signatories, passing a ban with crime means abandoning girls to clandestine practices, or traveling abroad to obtain certificates, while today the consultation is an opportunity to help girls “become aware of and free themselves from male domination or familiar “.

The appeal is signed, among others, by the director of the department of obstetrics-gynecology of the Bicêtre hospital in Paris, by the president of the feminist collective Cfcv Emmanuelle piet and by the president of Gynécologie Sans Frontières (Gsf) Claude rosenthal. The Minister of the Interior Gérard Darmanin, accompanied by the undersecretary of citizenship Marlène Schiappa, had announced the measure last week, based on a decision of the Medical Order.

“This examination – wrote the National Council of the Order in 2017 – has no medical justification and constitutes a violation of respect for the privacy of a young woman, especially when she is a minor.”

The idea that in France in 2020 there are still women (and doctors) dealing with virginity certificates, without legal value, seems incredible. But the solution, say the doctors behind the government appeal, is not a law. “It means attacking the effects while neglecting the cause that is rooted in ignorance and fear. Only education -conclude the signatories- will allow the emancipation of these young women.