Reviewed and updated 22 August 2026.
By Aneeta Prem MBE
Virginity testing and hymenoplasty are illegal throughout the United Kingdom. The law is clear because the practices can sit within a wider pattern of coercion, so-called honour-based abuse, forced marriage and control over women’s and girls’ sexuality.
There is also a basic medical fact that needs repeating: there is no examination that can prove whether a woman or girl has had sexual intercourse.
What is virginity testing?
Under the Health and Care Act 2022, virginity testing means examining female genitalia, with or without consent, for the purpose — or purported purpose — of determining virginity.
It may be described as a hymen examination, a “two-finger” test or another form of vaginal examination.
The Government’s multi-agency guidance, reflecting the position of the World Health Organization and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, states that virginity testing has no scientific merit or clinical indication.
The appearance or size of the hymen cannot establish whether somebody has had vaginal intercourse.
What is hymenoplasty?
Hymenoplasty is a procedure intended to reconstruct the hymen, usually by stitching hymenal remnants or using vaginal tissue.
It is often sought in the belief that it will cause bleeding during future intercourse and therefore “prove” virginity.
That belief is medically unreliable. Bleeding is not a reliable indicator of previous sexual activity, and hymenoplasty cannot create proof of virginity.
The legal ban does not prevent clinically necessary procedures performed on the hymen for genuine medical reasons, such as treatment of an imperforate hymen.
What the UK law prohibits
The Health and Care Act 2022 makes it illegal to:
- carry out virginity testing;
- offer to carry out virginity testing;
- aid or abet virginity testing;
- carry out hymenoplasty;
- offer to carry out hymenoplasty; or
- aid or abet hymenoplasty.
The offences apply across the UK, with provisions for the different legal jurisdictions.
They also have extra-territorial reach. UK nationals and residents can commit an offence through specified conduct outside the UK even if the procedure is not illegal in the country where it takes place.
The offences can carry a maximum sentence of five years’ imprisonment and/or an unlimited fine.
Consent does not make the procedures lawful
The law deliberately covers procedures carried out even where the woman or girl appears to consent.
That is because a request may itself arise from pressure, fear, marriage expectations, family reputation or the threat of violence.
A professional should therefore avoid treating a request as an isolated consumer choice without considering the wider circumstances.
Why these practices are a safeguarding concern
A demand for a virginity test or hymenoplasty can be a warning sign of other abuse.
The Government guidance identifies links with so-called honour-based abuse and stresses that professionals should consider risks including forced marriage, coercion and violence.
Possible indicators may include:
- pressure to prove sexual “purity” before marriage;
- fear about what relatives will do if virginity is questioned;
- an engagement or marriage being made conditional on a test;
- family members arranging or attending appointments;
- threats linked to reputation or shame;
- plans to travel overseas for a procedure; or
- a woman or girl being unable to speak privately.
No single sign proves abuse. The professional task is to understand the individual situation and assess risk.
Do not automatically involve family members
The 2025 Government guidance is explicit that information should not be shared with family or community members where doing so could put the woman or girl at greater risk.
Professionals should follow their organisation’s safeguarding procedures and share information with the appropriate agencies where necessary and lawful.
This is especially important where family members may be applying the pressure.
Why the myth of virginity is so harmful
The word “virginity” is used differently by different people and cultures. It is not a medical diagnosis.
Problems arise when a woman’s worth, marriageability or safety is made dependent on proving something that medicine cannot prove.
That turns a social expectation into control over the body.
It can also create danger for women and girls who fear punishment if they do not bleed on a wedding night or cannot satisfy relatives who demand “evidence”.
Where this connects with forced marriage
Virginity testing and hymenoplasty can be used before or around a planned marriage, particularly where family reputation and sexual behaviour are tightly controlled.
Professionals should therefore consider whether the person is also free to choose whether, when and whom they marry.
If saying no to a test, procedure or marriage would lead to threats or punishment, that loss of choice is itself a safeguarding concern.
Why this law mattered to the wider campaign
Campaigning against virginity testing and hymenoplasty helped move practices that were sometimes treated as private or cultural into a clear safeguarding and legal framework.
I have consistently argued that no idea of family honour can justify control over a woman or girl’s body. In my own work I use the term dishonour abuse to place shame with those causing harm rather than with the person being controlled.
When referring to legislation and official guidance, however, I use the Government’s terminology accurately.
Final word
Virginity cannot be medically proved.
Testing for it is illegal. Reconstructing a hymen to create the appearance of proof is also illegal.
The safeguarding question is not whether a woman or girl can satisfy somebody else’s demand for purity. It is whether she is safe, free from pressure and able to make decisions about her own body and future.
Sources and further reading
- GOV.UK: virginity testing and hymenoplasty multi-agency guidance, updated August 2025
- Health and Care Act 2022, Part 5
