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Chemical castration and unsound ethics | Brief letters

Sex offenders | Punctuation pedant | Colons | Semicolons | Kiwi clueMedical experts say they’ll refuse to implement mandatory chemical castration, and one states: “Doctors are not agents of social control. It would be ethically unsound to use medication to reduce risk rather than to treat a medical condition” (Report, 22 May). Yet in psychiatry, social control is routinely exercised, and drugs are often prescribed not to alleviate suffering, but primarily to manage perceived risk. Sex offenders should not be given more ethical consideration and bodily autonomy than psychiatric patients.Jacqui DillonLondon• I must take issue with Marilyn Rowley over the use of the semicolon (Letters, 26 May). Reading a sentence aloud with measured pauses will not cut the mustard; an essential prerequisite is a grasp of the difference between a phrase and a main clause. I pontificate as a retired pedagogical pedant who should get out more.Ian BargeLudlow, Shropshire Continue reading...

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