Health board ‘misled young patients’ over puberty drug, Times Scotland

Doesn't mention the impact of the loss of oestrogen on female bodies who take testosterone or have oopherectomies.

Cos, that stuff kills us eventually.

It's fucking terrifying. Hippocrates didn't say "first do no harm - unless you really, really, really want to be boy"

And there's a possible/probably impact on brain development. You think they'd at least pause on their rush to medicalise given these dangers.

From the comments:

'It’s all well and good to say that the risks are explained in consultations but the problem is that with lengthy waiting lists, this pamphlet was the only accessible official information for young people- our GP directed us towards it! It gave young people an entirely misleading perception around the potential risks, setting the idea in their heads for a very long time pre-consultation that these are perfectly safe. Reality is that there are many unknowns around them.'

One of the things that most annoys me about this whole issue is the extent to which known facts, research, evidence, rational behaviours are simply set aside once the word 'trans' is mentioned. In the medical world it's particularly disturbing.

a Glasgow health official admitted that the effect of blockers on bone density was unknown. “Uncertainties also exist regarding the effect of puberty suppression on growth and adult height

Just to focus on one aspect - I presume this means that if you take PBs and growth slows, once you stop taking PBs, growing might resume, but you'll have missed out x amount of growth and presumably will therefore remain shorter than you would have without PBs. That's a fairly straightforward and measurable impact that's clearly not reversible, isn't it? So even if this one thing isn't reversible, to say they are 'fully reversible' is plainly not true, before we even get into all the other effects.

The same official pointed out that discontinuing treatment “will lead to the reactivation of the pituitary-gonadal axis; in that respect, the effects of [puberty blockers] are considered completely reversible”.

That's interesting - that is the technical definition of "reversible" I was thinking might justify the statement in another thread.

Yes, they haven't actually surgically removed anything, so the bits of the body can start working again, but you've disrupted the system.

Similarly, the standard contraceptive pill is fully reversible in that sense, but if you take it from age 20-35, you will significantly impact your chance of having a child. You won't switch back to age-20 fertility when you stop taking it.