A senior Russian MP has proposed providing so-called “conversion”
therapy to gays and a ban on gay men donating blood and organs
State Duma MP Mikhail Degtyarev, also a Moscow mayoral candidate,
laid out his proposals during a press conference held in Moscow,
Russia
Today (RT) reported.
“We will suggest amendment to the law on donors that reintroduce
homosexuality to the list of contraindications for blood donations in
Health Ministry instruction,” Degtyarev told reporters
Degtyarev insisted that the ban was not discriminatory because 65
percent of HIV-positive persons in Russia are gay, though he did not
provide the source of this statistic.
The “ex-gay” therapy, Degtyarev said, would be free, voluntary
and anonymous, and allow gays to “return to a normal life and
become heterosexuals, as are 95 to 99 percent of our citizens.”
He also suggested that gay people could hold Gay Pride marches
without running afoul of a law banning “gay propaganda” to minors
by holding the events at night.
“The law presumes that they should not hold Gay Pride events
when children can see them. But it is very possible to hold them at
night, with flashlights and without amplifiers,” Degtyarev
explained.
Nikolay Alekseyev, a prominent gay rights activist, criticized the
proposed blood ban in remarks to Interfax: “We've lived without
these restrictions for five years. It has not aggravated the
situation with diseases. Modern methods of diagnosis allow early
detection of infected blood and if they impose the ban this would
only deprive patients of blood from some donors.”