Treating homosexuality as a sickness

Editor—At the end of her Editor's choice on medicine's shameful past MacDonald concedes that social norms define an attitude as a disease.¹ If this is the shape of things to come, then it is high time to rethink the “limit” to which our social norms should be allowed to challenge the indications for labelling something as a sickness.

I hope I don't live to see the day when doctors will be penalised for asking people to avoid overconsumption of alcohol just because it may be the social norm at that time to drink as much as you like without any fear of being apprehended. Doctors must subscribe to changing social norms, but at the same time they should endeavour to continue classifying something as a sickness if there is a sound scientific evidence to do so, even if norms have changed. A sickness is not cured if all people acquire it, it only raises more concern to do something more... don't hang up your gloves for fear of challenging the social norms of the time.