MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Alabama lawmakers have passed legislation calling for chemical castration for anyone who commits a sex crime against a child younger than 13, First Coast News reported.

Under the bill, it would apply to offenders prior to their release from prison and would be mandatory for parole.

The offender would also be required to pay for their own castration.

Chemical castration involves the administration of antiandrogen drugs, such as cyproterone acetate, flutamide, or gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonists.

Introduced in Alabama by state Rep. Stephen Hurst, he expressed hopes it would deter sex offenders from acting.

“I had people call me in the past when I introduced it and said don’t you think this is inhumane? I asked them what’s more inhumane than when you take a little infant child, and you sexually molest that infant child when the child cannot defend themselves or get away, and they have to go through all the things they have to go through. If you want to talk about inhumane–that’s inhumane,” Hurst, a Republican, told CBS affiliate WIAT-TV.

The bill is likely to be challenged in courts as a violation of the 8th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution if it is signed into law by Governor Kay Ivey.

Other states, including California, Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, Montana, Oregon and Wisconsin all have passed similar laws allowing chemical castration in some form, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Texas allows repeat sex offenders to voluntarily elect to be surgically castrated, the Associated Press reports.

It should be noted that chemical castration is most effective if the offender actually desires to modify their errant behavior, as it diminishes, but does not entirely eradicate, the offender’s sex drive. Chemical castration is accomplished through medication via prescription.

While the term “castration” rouses the imagination, University of California at Berkeley professors, and a sex crime expert, Frank Zimring, noted that:

“Chemical castration is half advertising slogan, half fantasy. There are chemicals which are supposed to, if dosages are maintained, reduce sex drives…That isn’t castration.”

Associated Press