Governor Mills this morning signed a bill into law that bans conversion therapy for minors.

It would prevent most licensed medical professionals from performing all forms of conversion therapy and only applies to minors.

Maine becomes the 17th state and the last New England state to ban conversion therapy.

Advocates say this is needed to protect LGBTQ young people from the practice.

Today at the State House Rep. Ryan Fecteau, (D) Biddeford, said, "We send a clear message to LGBTQ youth, here and across the country, that your legislators and your governor are on your side as well, and you can count on us."

The new law goes into effect 90 days after the legislature adjourns. </s> AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) - Maine banned gay conversion therapy for minors on Wednesday, joining more than a dozen other states that have outlawed the controversial practice.

Democratic Gov. Janet Mills signed the bill Wednesday, and it will take effect 90 days after the Legislature adjourns next month.

Conversion therapy aims to change a person's sexual orientation or gender identity. Under the new law, professionals, including school psychologists, pharmacy technicians and social workers, who have advertised, offered or administered conversion therapy to a child could face discipline from licensing boards.

Maine joins 16 other states and the District of Columbia that have banned the practice. Supporters decry it as a harmful and note the American Psychological Association opposes the therapy.

"Conversion therapy is a harmful, widely discredited practice that has no place in Maine," Mills said. "By signing this bill into law today, we send an unequivocal message to young LGBTQ people in Maine and across the country: We stand with you, we support you, and we will always defend your right to be who you are."

A law against conversion therapy was signed recently in Massachusetts, while states including North Carolina are considering such legislation this year.

"With this law, Maine is taking seriously its responsibility to ensure youth and parents who seek support are not subjected to fraudulent and dangerous practices under the guise of therapy," said Mary Bonauto, the Civil Rights Project director for GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders.

Maine's former Republican governor vetoed a similar measure last year, but the bill has gained momentum this year under a Democratic-led Legislature. Republicans argued that the bill was unnecessary, while also contending that it would prevent parents from seeking religious counselors for their children.

"There have not been any recorded cases of this happening in Maine," said state House Republicans spokesman John Bott.

Republicans failed to pass an amendment to exclude talk therapy and counseling from counting as conversion therapy.

Maine's law exempts treatment that offers acceptance, support and understanding while being neutral on sexual orientation and gender identity. </s> AUGUSTA — Gov. Janet Mills signed a bill Wednesday making Maine the 17th state to ban so-called “conversion therapy” that attempts to change the sexual orientation or gender identity of minors.

Mills, a Democrat, signed the bill while surrounded by legislators, young people and advocates for Maine’s LGBTQ community who were involved in the multi-year effort to enact a ban on conversion therapy.

The bill, which was sponsored by Assistant Majority Leader Rep. Ryan Fecteau, D-Biddeford, would prohibit state-licensed counselors, psychologists, social workers, health professionals, guidance counselors as well as pastoral and family therapists from engaging in conversion therapy.

The new law defines conversion therapy as “any practice or treatment that seeks or claims to change an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity, including, but not limited to, any effort to change gender expression or to eliminate or reduce sexual or romantic attractions, feelings or behavior toward others based on the individual’s gender.”

It would not prohibit treatment for individuals undergoing gender transition, counseling that seeks to prevent unsafe sexual practices or any “neutral” talk therapy intended to help a minor cope with issues.

A similar bill passed the Legislature last year only to be vetoed by former Republican Gov. Paul LePage.

“Conversion therapy is a harmful, widely-discredited practice that has no place in Maine,” Mills said in a statement. “By signing this bill into law today, we send an unequivocal message to young LGBTQ people in Maine and across the country: we stand with you, we support you, and we will always defend your right to be who you are.”

The practice is now banned in every New England state plus 11 other states and the District of Columbia. </s> Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D) has signed legislation to ban the practice of gay conversion therapy on minors.

“Today I signed into law a bill banning conversion therapy, a widely-discredited practice that has no place in Maine,” Mills announced on Twitter on Wednesday.

“Today, we send an unequivocal message to young LGBTQ people: we stand with you, we support you, and we will always defend your right to be who you are,” she continued.

Today I signed into law a bill banning conversion therapy, a widely-discredited practice that has no place in Maine. Today, we send an unequivocal message to young LGBTQ people: we stand with you, we support you, and we will always defend your right to be who you are. pic.twitter.com/heInzibvFJ — Governor Janet Mills (@GovJanetMills) May 29, 2019

The bill prohibits the “advertising, offering and administering of therapy designed to change a person's sexual orientation or gender identity, also known as conversion therapy, to individuals under 18 years of age” in the state.

The practice of conversion therapy has long been condemned by medical and mental health professionals as ineffective. It is believed to be capable of causing severe psychological harm to individuals.

The legislation also states in its findings that the practice “is based on the false premise that being lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender is a mental illness or disorder and is caused by a developmental deficiency, trauma, abuse or unmet emotional needs and that conversion therapy can alter a person's sexual orientation or gender identity.”

According to a local NBC station, Mills’s signature makes Maine the 17th state in the country to outlaw conversion therapy. A number of states have passed similar bans in recent months, including Delaware and California. </s> Conversion therapy will be banned in Maine.

Governor Mills will sign the bill into law today.

Conversion therapy is the practice used to convert gay people to heterosexuality through psychological or spiritual intervention.

The legislation prohibits licensed medical and mental health practitioners from trying to change a minor's sexual orientation or gender identity. </s> With her action on Wednesday, Maine joins 16 states that have banned the practice, which aims to change a person's sexual orientation or gender identity.

Mills said that the law sends "an unequivocal message" to the LGBTQ community that "we stand with you, we support you and we will always defend your right to be who you are."

She called conversion therapy "a harmful, widely discredited practice that has no place in Maine."

Maine's former Republican governor vetoed a similar measure last year, but the bill has gained momentum this year under a Democratic-led Legislature. </s> LONDON -- The British government says it will ban gay conversion therapy as part of 4.5-million-pound ($5.9 million) effort to make society more inclusive for LGBT people. The initiative comes after the government released the results of a survey of 108,000 LGBT people, which found that 5 percent had been offered conversion therapies. The government says it will "eradicate the abhorrent practice."

The survey also found that LGBT people experience prejudice daily, with more than two in three saying they avoid holding hands with a same-sex partner in public for fear of a negative reaction.

Prime Minister Theresa May says, "no one should ever have to hide who they are or who they love."

The government's 75-point plan includes appointment of a national LGBT health adviser to improve care for the community.

According to CBS News partner network BBC News, the government will, "consider all legislative and non-legislative options to prohibit promoting, offering or conducting conversion therapy."

In the U.S., a growing number of states and municipalities are also banning gay conversion therapies. Maryland was the latest to make such a move, with Gov. Larry Hogan signing a bill into law in May to prohibit health professionals from using the practice on minors. Maryland was the 11th state to enact legislation against the practice.

Supporters of bans note that gay conversion therapy has been widely discredited by U.S. medical and mental health associations, and say barring it helps protect youths from depression, anxiety and potential suicide by preventing them from being forced into such treatment. </s> Does Science Support Bans on ‘Conversion Therapy’ for Gender-Identity Issues?

TOLEDO, Ohio — When the city of Toledo approved a ban on “conversion therapy” this month, the law explicitly prohibited treatment designed to help patients align their gender identity with their biological sex.

“[N]o mental health provider shall engage in sexual orientation or gender-identity change efforts with any person,” read the law, which states that it would be a misdemeanor of the fourth degree for a therapist to provide such treatment, with a fine of $250 imposed on the perpetrator.

Media reports on the ban presented “conversion therapy,” also known as reparative therapy, as a widely discredited practice, though the actual treatment was unspecified.

“I think the science is clear that conversion therapy is harmful to individuals,” said Councilwoman Theresa Gabriel in a statement before the ban was approved.

Bans on “conversion therapy” — a term that until recently primarily described attempts to reverse unwanted same-sex attraction — are not new. California, New Jersey, Oregon, Illinois, Vermont and New York have barred or penalized the practice through legislative or regulatory action, as has Washington, D.C., and a handful of U.S. cities.

Opponents of reparative therapy claim the practice has harmed patients, who suffer from higher levels of depression and suicidal feelings. Its defenders say practitioners adhere to professional protocols and many people have benefited.

Now, homosexual-rights activists are adopting similar claims of the therapy’s harm as they seek to ban therapies designed to help patients realign their gender identity with their biological sex. Their arguments have received relatively little public scrutiny, though the medical debate over treating gender-identity disorder, also known as “gender dysphoria” — an intense experience of conflict between one’s biological sex and the gender with which one identifies — in the young is far from resolved.

“Currently there is a vigorous, albeit suppressed, debate among physicians, therapists and academics regarding what is fast becoming the new treatment standard for [gender dysphoria] in children,” read a statement on gender-identity disorder issued by American College of Pediatricians in August 2016.

“This new paradigm is rooted in the assumption that GD is innate,” the statement continued, noting protocols for medical intervention that suppresses puberty and then introduces cross-sex hormones that match the preferred gender identity.

Specialists on one side of this debate also support what clinicians call the “affirmative” treatment model, which encourages boys identifying as girls and girls identifying as boys to adopt the pronouns, clothing and school bathrooms that correspond with their gender identity. This model is designed to support, rather than discourage, the patient’s identification with the opposite sex.

In contrast, other clinicians note that most young people will outgrow this condition, and so they recommend either a neutral response to the patient’s identification with the opposite sex or a more explicitly corrective approach designed to help the patient embrace the gender expression that aligns with their biological sex.

Dr. Paul Hruz, a pediatric endocrinologist at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, challenges the claim that science supports a ban on corrective or neutral responses to this condition. Likewise, he questioned whether research endorses an “affirmative model,” which has led to guidelines that direct students to use the bathroom that corresponds with their gender identity.

“The vast majority of children with gender dysphoria will realign their gender identity to match their sex,” Hruz told the Register.

“The transgender identity will persist in a small percentage, 5%-20%, and usually the dividing line is adolescence,” he added.

He noted that those who identify as their opposite sex after their teenage years are less likely to change. He also emphasized that specialists still cannot predict “who will continue in that transgender identity and who will not.”

Given these established facts about the small percentage of young people diagnosed with gender-identity disorder — about 0.05% of the population — Hruz worried that the “affirming model” could lead more young people to retain their identification with the opposite sex into adulthood and may play a role in the reported increase in adolescents receiving puberty blockers and cross-sex hormone therapy, often in preparation for surgery that alters their bodies to correspond more with their sexual identity.

Hruz is equally concerned about the long-term impact of puberty suppressants, which are introduced around age 12, and cross-sex hormones, introduced after age 14.

The Endocrine Society supports these medical interventions for children diagnosed with gender dysphoria. But the guidelines published by the professional society acknowledge that they are based on low-quality scientific evidence, and in many areas solely on expert opinion and not scientific studies, Hruz said.

“Puberty suppression — the first stage during which endocrinologists are asked to intervene — is presented as ‘safe and reversible,’” he said. “But there is no scientific evidence to support the view that this is safe.”

“You are disrupting the normal process of physical and psychological development that takes place during this period, and that could have serious long-term consequences,” Hruz stated.

The American College of Pediatricians’ statement raised similar concerns. Treatment protocols that combine puberty suppressants and cross-sex hormones result “in the sterility of minors,” the professional group stated, while disputing the scientific basis for arguments that present gender-identity disorder as “innate,” and thus fixed.

At one time, more medical specialists expressed similar reservations about the value of an affirmative model linked to medical intervention because the condition was understood to be fluid for most patients, who ultimately aligned their gender with their sex. But over the past decade, influential clinicians, like Dr. Norman Spack, the groundbreaking leader of the gender-management program at Boston Children’s Hospital, have established new guidelines for treatment.

In a 2015 interview posted on the website of Boston Children’s Hospital, Spack acknowledged that his methods remained controversial, given the fact that gender-identity disorder is resolved over time in most patients.

“There are still those who feel that because 60% to 80% of kids who act in a cross-gender way aren’t in fact transgender, we shouldn’t be encouraging this. This is one of the big debates,” said Spack.

“And why do you believe we should be encouraging transgender people to seek treatment?” he was asked.

“Forty-five percent of transgender 16- to 25-year-olds who don’t have any support attempt suicide,” he said.

He added that suicidal thoughts can persist in some children who begin treatment, but that changes when medical interventions begin.

“The minute these kids even know they’re going to get the puberty suppressants, their suicidal thoughts melt away,” he said.

Further, Spack questioned guidelines that restrict procedures, like the surgical removal of female breasts, to late adolescence.

“All you have to do is see a girl in a binder with clips all the way from her armpits to her hips,” he said. “Why should I make her wait until she’s 18 when I can relieve her suffering at 14?”

However, while Spack defended surgical intervention as a valuable treatment option for patients who contemplate suicide, some studies report a higher than average rate of suicide attempts in this demographic even after surgery has taken place.

“The scientific evidence summarized suggests we take a skeptical view toward the claim that sex-reassignment procedures provide the hoped-for benefits or resolve the underlying issues that contribute to elevated mental-health risks among the transgender population,” stated “Sexuality and Gender,” a summary of almost 200 peer-reviewed studies on gender identity and related topics.

Released in August 2016, the report was written by Dr. Lawrence Mayer, scholar in residence in the Department of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University and professor of statistics and biostatistics at Arizona State University, and Dr. Paul McHugh, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine who served for 25 years as psychiatrist in chief at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

The authors expressed grave concern about the high rate of suicide associated with individuals who identified as “transgender,” but they also said the science did not support recourse to medical intervention and surgery, and more research was needed.

In the years before bans on reparative therapy emerged as a mainstream political issue, gender-management programs like the one established at Boston Children’s Hospital drew little scrutiny outside of the medical profession and the small number of parents struggling to help children who were profoundly uncomfortable with their bodies.

Now, such clinicians may find themselves under attack if they seek to cure, rather than affirm, gender-identity disorder.

The story of Kenneth Zucker, a leading Canadian researcher and clinician who adopted a nuanced two-step approach for treating children with gender dysphoria, is instructive.

For decades, Zucker operated without much public controversy as he encouraged his patients to realign their gender with their biological sex and only approved medical interventions when the initial therapy proved unsuccessful.

“Just because kids are saying something doesn’t necessarily mean you accept it, or that it’s true, or that it could be in the best interests of the child,” said Zucker, explaining his approach in a BBC documentary, Transgender Kids: Who Knows Best?

Then, a few years ago, Zucker began to face mounting criticism from homosexual-rights activists. And in late 2015, he was fired from his post.

“For more than 30 years Dr. Kenneth Zucker ran Canada’s biggest child gender clinic and was considered a recognized authority on childhood gender dysphoria, until he lost his job,” read a statement released by the BBC, defending the film. “He believes he was fired for challenging the gender affirmative approach.”

Hershel Russell, a critic of Zucker’s methods, argues in the documentary that people struggling with their sexual identity don’t need psychiatric evaluations. “It’s not about mental health, so why does it belong in a mental-health institution?” he asked.

Activists launched a petition campaign to prevent the airing of the BBC documentary. That effort failed, but it marked their strong desire to control the debate over treatment options and force skeptics in the medical community to fall in line.

The perplexing refusal to tolerate therapies designed to foster an alignment between gender identity and sex has already made it tough for psychologists, doctors and families who want to help patients resolve problems that are associated with serious mental-health problems.

“If a family is dealing with this issue, they should seek guidance from a trustworthy source,” said John Di Camillo, a staff ethicist at the Philadelphia-based National Catholic Bioethics Center.

Di Camilllo said that it was important to establish whether a child actually suffered from gender-identity disorder, as opposed to a bodily condition arising from underdeveloped genitalia where the biological sex is ambiguous.

Common symptoms of gender dysphoria include a marked incongruity between gender expression and biological sex that lasts six months or longer, and such conditions are accompanied by “some kind of experience of detrimental or harmful social impacts,” he said.

The child or adolescent “can’t function because of the anxiety that comes from functioning in the wrong body.”

In such cases, professional help is recommended. Therapy in accord with Catholic anthropology will help these persons “learn to understand and accept their actual bodily sex and see their body as good,” Di Camillo noted, and it will likely foster a process of gender clarification that allows the patients to accept their bodies and be at peace.

But Di Camillo warned that most specialists will adopt a treatment model that affirms the patient's gender identity and is not designed to realign their gender with their biological sex.

“We have lost sight of the deeper underlying sense of who the human person is, and that is causing us to focus on short-term happiness or satisfaction, as opposed to an authentic fulfillment and a genuine florishing of that human person,” he said, and suggested that concerned parents obtain a referral for a trustworthy therapist from their Catholic school or church.

As he turned from issues in clinical practice to the public-policy debate, Di Camillo predicted that the campaign to extend antidiscrimination protections to gender identity will increasingly shape the response of the medical community and insurance carriers.

Already, Catholic hospitals have faced mounting pressure to accommodate the new protocols designed to help teenagers transition to their preferred sexual identity.

Meanwhile, the furious reaction of activists to the nuanced methods of experts like Kenneth Zucker highlights the political stakes for the homosexual-rights movement, which increasingly opposes any suggestion that gender may not be a fixed condition. That resistance deserves more scrutiny from policymakers than it has received, say critics who argue that gender ideology, not science, is behind this trend.

“For decades, gay activists have claimed that people who have same-sex attraction are born that way,” said Katherine Kersten, a policy fellow at the Minneapolis-based Center of the American Experiment, who published an article on gender ideology in the February issue of First Things.

“The claim of an inborn trait is their link [to similar claims of discrimination based on] race and sex. It allows activists to bring their claims under the civil-rights rubric.”

“They are hostile to anything that suggests that might not be the case,” said Kerstin, noting the angry pushback against patients who resolved their condition with therapy.

Indeed, as the debate over the therapeutic response to gender-identity disorder becomes more toxic, specialists like Hruz fear that much-needed research to evaluate the outcomes of various treatment models, including alternative approaches that help the patients accept their bodies, will never be approved.

“The controlled studies that are needed, but likely will never be done,” said Hruz, “can include efforts to support and affirm the inherent dignity of people with gender dysphoria while acknowledging biological reality.” </s> A federal judge has temporarily blocked new restrictions on abortion providers that receive federal family planning funds, including one in Maine.

The rule from the U.S. Health and Human Services Department would ban family planning clinics that receive federal Title X funds from making abortion referrals — what critics are calling a “gag rule.” Those clinics would also be barred from providing abortion services in the same buildings where they provide other health services such as cancer and STD screening, a requirement that would increase costs for many providers.

The proposed rule prompted lawsuits across the country. In March, Maine Family Planning and the global Center for Reproductive Rights filed its own complaint against the federal government in U.S. District Court in Portland.

The plaintiffs argue that the rule violates the constitutional rights of women and medical professionals, and that it was adopted without the justification required under the law. They said the expense associated with the new rule would force Maine Family Planning to stop offering abortion services at all but one of its family planning clinics in the state. Under that scenario, Mainers would have only three publicly accessible locations for abortion care across the state — the flagship Maine Family Planning Clinic in Augusta, the Mabel Wadsworth Center in Bangor and the Planned Parenthood location in Portland.

Later that month, they also filed a motion for preliminary injunction, which asked a judge to stop the rule from taking effect in May as planned. Then U.S. District Judge Stanley Bastian granted a similar motion Thursday in response to lawsuits from the state of Washington and the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association. His sweeping order barred the Trump administration from implementing the rule anywhere in the country while the legal challenges are pending.

With that decision, Maine Family Planning withdrew its own motion, saying it was no longer necessary. But the organization pledged in a statement to keep fighting the new rule.

“MFP is relieved that the Domestic Gag Rule has been temporarily blocked,” Maine Family Planning President and CEO George Hill said. “Along with our Title X allies nationwide, we’re breathing a sigh of relief today, knowing our robust network can continue to provide high quality, affordable, and evidence-based reproductive health care as it has done for almost 50 years.

“The Gag Rule threatens access to essential health care services for low-income and rural Mainers, and that’s why we’re battling it in court – for our patients and our neighbors. Our fight continues.”

The Title X program serves about 4 million people annually. The grants fund family planning services like contraception and STD screening to low-income individuals for free or at low cost. In 2017, the most recent year data is available, the program administered more than $280 million in federal grants to clinics. Federal laws prohibit the use of taxpayer funds to pay for abortions in most circumstances, so Title X grants do not pay for those services.

Maine Family Planning receives $2 million annually in Title X funding. The agency operates its own 18 clinics and shares the federal funds with 29 other health centers across Maine. Attorneys from the Center for Reproductive Rights said last month that they chose to mount a legal challenge in U.S. District Court in Portland because Maine Family Planning is the sole grantee in the largely rural state, and low-income patients here have few other options for those services.

A spokeswoman said Maine Family Planning provides about 500 abortions each year.

Still, anti-abortion activists have argued that organizations with any connection to abortion should not receive federal fund at all. A Department of Health and Human Services press release announcing the new rule in March said it will “provide needed clarity” for the public and for clinics about what is allowed and not allowed by law.

“The final rule ensures compliance with statutory program integrity provisions governing the program and, in particular, the statutory prohibition on funding programs where abortion is a method of family planning,” the release stated.

It was not clear Friday what the next event will be in the Maine Family Planning lawsuit.

Megan Gray can be contacted at 791-6327 or at:

 [email protected]

 Twitter: mainemegan
Maine becomes the 17th U.S. state to ban conversion therapy for minors.