One of the doctors who wrote a searing critique of the Australian Medical Association’s Position Statement on changing the Marriage Act repeated his call for the AMA to retract the statement following an address by Australian Medical Association (AMA) President Dr Michael Gannon at the National Press Club today. 

The critique has now been signed by more than five hundred Australian doctors including 26 professors and six past AMA state presidents and can be found at critiqueAMA.com.

The doctors have urged the AMA to retract its Position Statement and to cease misrepresenting social science in a political cause.

Queensland GP, Dr David van Gend said:
“The AMA has misled the public on same-sex marriage.

“The AMA’s Position Statement uses spurious evidence to claim a link between our marriage laws and LGBT mental health.

"That is unacceptable from our peak medical body.

“The AMA is also misleading politicians. Catherine King, the federal opposition spokeswoman for health, relies on the AMA’s unjustified claims in an article on marriage and LGBT mental health written by her today for The Australian.

“The only evidence the AMA Position Statement provides for the alleged health benefits of changing our marriage law is a single study from a single clinic in the USA fourteen years ago. In that study, annual mental health visits by LGBT people dropped from 3.35 to 2.93 visits per person after the marriage law changed, a marginal finding for which there was no control group of non-LGBT patients.

“That is no scientific basis for public policy”, said Dr van Gend.

“On the question of redefining marriage, the AMA has allowed ideology to triumph over clinical science.”

The AMA Position Statement and the Critique can be read at www.CritiqueAMA.com