Concerns that requests from Muslim immigrants for medical certificates of virginity could soon become common have led Spain's conservative party Partido Popular to propose a new law in the parliament of Andalucia.
The party wants Andalucia's health department to warn doctors that virginity certificates are an invasion of a patient's privacy and that “doctors must preserve [such privacy] as guaranteed by the Spanish constitution.”
Ms Esperanza Oña, the Partido Popular's health coordinator in Andalucia—the Spanish region with the greatest Muslim population—said she had passed on her party's initiative to the Official Medical College of Malaga and that the Official Medical College of Barcelona was drawing up a consensus report.
Dr Jaume Padrós, secretary of the Official Medical College of Barcelona, agreed with Ms Oña that virginity certificates invaded the privacy of women and that it was not ethical for a doctor to draw up and sign such a certificate. He argued that the aim of medical certificates was to certify “health states,” and whether a woman was a virgin was not a medical condition.
“Certifying that a woman has an intact or ruptured hymen isn't a doctor's work and has nothing to do with medical practice, either in public or private sectors,” Dr Padrós said.
He added that the college's ethical commission would soon release an “official position report” so that Catalan doctors were aware of how to act.