Ban on puberty blockers to be made indefinite on experts’ advice

And yet Cass concluded there was not evidence for the benefits, and who might benefit.

You (and I) may think there is no such thing as a trans child who needs medical transition, but that is not what Cass concluded.

We have to deal with the reality of that.

Cass only commented on medical evidence, we have to also win the argument on the ideology that there are no trans children to really stop any children being given these medications.

Or we wait for the clinical trials to conclusively show that this is a messed up idea with no benefits but that will rquire another generatation of kids mediacised first.

No, I object to torturing children by saying they are getting time-critical life-changing treatment which they know full well is their sole ticket to escaping a life of direct transphobia, but actually witholding it for some of them.

I wholeheartedly support letting kids choose whether or not to take it and recording the long-term outcomes of either in detail.

There is no need for a ban to do that. What purpose does a ban serve if it's safe enough to run a trial and safe enough for current patients to continue?

It's a flex; an appeasement gesture. A sacrifice.

A dear friend of mine has the BRCA gene; her aunt died young from ovarian cancer. As soon as she knew, she signed up to all the clinical trials available, and offerered her personal data for ongoing research. Compare and contrast with the furious reaction to obtaining adult transition data.

The nation's cats and dogs have received better evidence-based healthcare at the vets than gender-distressed children over the past decades.

I left teaching in 2010...and ''transgender' simply wasn't a thing, even then.....nobody had heard of it. That's not to say that children have not always struggled with their developing identity/sexuality...but the 'trans' gave them a label and a pathway on which to peg their distress.

Are you entirely unconcerned by the harms associated with not going through puberty? Are you not interested at all in a risk vs. benefit evaluation?

Cass did leave open the possibility that there may be some children for whom medical transition may be the correct pathway.

We just don't know who.

If that were true how would we know who without a trial?

Cass only went as far as she could which wasn't to say there is no evidence this treatment will only harm and never be beneficial.
Wes is only able to say today they should not be prescribed without/ until we have the evidence.

We need to get wise to that reality and fight the trials instead of arguing what we wish Cass had said.

I think you have to build a culture. There's a long way to go but we've started on the right path. If puberty blockers are not a first line of treatment then the response to a child who expresses a cross-sex identity changes. It changes for the health professionals, the teachers, the parents - even if it's just the confidence for them to follow their instincts. If it's no longer acceptable to socially transition a child and deal with the consequences with drugs later then children will have to be supported to face the distress of puberty and get through it. And we know that for most gender-distressed children, puberty is the cure. For some children, just a delay in taking any steps towards transition will be enough of a benefit.

I'm sure some people will be determined enough to obtain illegal hormones, or to use any loophole they can but culturally this will be seen differently.

There was a time when there was nothing stopping the posting of pro-anorexia material online. That no doubt contributed to more girls developing the condition but we tackled that and we raised awareness so although you're always going to have some content and you'll always have people developing eating disorders, there is a collective, protective response from health professions, teachers, etc. We need to get there with cross-sex ideation too.

The outcome of jumping from a plane without a parachute or going deep sea diving without scuba equipment is obvious, and we have decades and decades of data about car safety (as well as crash test dummies).

The likely outcome of a "trans child" not taking puberty blockers is not that they will die. It is that they will grow out of it and go on to become a normal adult.

Yes, we do already know the outcome of using puberty blockers.

We know that:

Children who take puberty blockers have a near 100% rate of going on to take cross sex hormones.

Children who take puberty blockers suffer from a multitude of negative side effects, including but not limited to loss of future sexual function, loss of future fertility, decreased bone density and impaired brain development (and probably more we don't yet know about).

Boys who take puberty blockers are very unlikely to have a successful vaginoplasty in later life because there is not enough tissue to work with.

Children who do not take puberty blockers mostly desist.

That's why Butterfly objects to any kind of clinical trial where there is a control group.

Shall we test parachutes, scuba equipment and seatbelts with a control group as well?

So, you are only referring to the evidence listed in the Cass Report then?

There is no evidence that Dr Hillary Cass' team missed in their review in your opinion?

You really have no idea do you?

I had no idea puberty blockers even existed when I, and all the other trans kids in my cohort, asked for help nearly three decades ago.

Our parents had no idea they existed either.

My parents tried to talk me out of it.

So did the staff at the Tavi.

It didn't work.

Because for some gender dysphoric children, averting the source of their gender dysphoria is the right course of action. As any of us can tell you. As the international community of clinicians who have been working with gender incongruent children all their lives can tell you. As Cass herself, who compiled and reviewed their research, has personally said on record.

I agree that this announced 'ban' will help parents who want to say no to puberty blockers.
But those hildren with sceptical parents already had an advantage to esscape the harm of this ideology unscathed anyway. The parents ones celebrating thier trans kids and with trans flags in their bios will be the one signing their kids up for the research and tohse were the most vulnerable kids any way.

In reality I think the GC's on here and Butterflyhatched are using the same argument: we know the outcome for puberty blockers on kids so there should be no need for a trial.

It's just the GC think we have prooef they are harmful, BH thinks we have proof they are beneficial.

Unfortunately for both Cass only concluded we didn't have enough evidneec so trials will (I think) happen much the upset of the GC and the TRAs.

I hope there are real safeguards in the trials to identify vulnerable childrem (proably all of them) and the numbers are very limited (preferably non of them) but unfortunately I think this won't happen, as the new clinics are staffed by WPATH style TRAs, and the trial status will allow lots of children join.

It looks like we may have another generation to go before the 'evidence' allows this to be concluded and their is a real ban.

I really don't this announcemnt today is the conclusion.

I think Butterfly is referring to the Dutch study from the early 1990s, in which all the test subjects were male, and the results of which its own authors don't agree support the use of puberty blockers the way they are used today.

the children who are following in our footsteps

I don't suppose the Pied Piper imagery was what this poster meant to invoke. But it's what immediately came to my mind.

@MissScarletInTheBallroom
In short, puberty blockers can only ever be beneficial to children who have already been irreparably psychologically harmed.

Quite!

But you object to the idea of a control group?

Oh oooh do I get to say it? Do I? Just this once? As a treat?

Did you read the Cass Review?

Can you please post all the links that you have for the 'three decades worth of evidence' that has been rejected?

I have absolutely no problem with responsible scientific research into this subject. I am not afraid of the findings. Why would I be? I've experienced them firsthand. I know what they're going to find.

This is really interesting. Thanks for summarising.

Could this mean that girls try to source testosterone from illegal sources? And boys doing the same with puberty blockers?

I'm not sure how a clinical trial will happen but how do you convince these children/young people with access to the internet that these treatments are not going to help them without trial data?

And if the results of a clinical trial wouldn't help convince them, are they not the same people most likely to gain access to drugs illegally?

I'm just not sure what this ban is going to do in reality

And the only reason those boys could benefit from puberty blockers is because they were unlucky enough to have abusive parents like Susie Green who allowed them to believe they were girls at an age when they were too young to understand that you don't get to choose whether to be a boy or a girl.

In short, puberty blockers can only ever be beneficial to children who have already been irreparably psychologically harmed.

Just for those who may have missed it, this is the WPATH files which shows some truly irresponsible decisions by clinicians who have been advocating for these treatment plans.

Here is one link to the WPATH pdf

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/56a45d683b0be33df885def6/t/65e64b9e5cbd756da9fbbdfa/1709591479160/Final+WPATH+Report.pdf

and another

https://environmentalprogress.org/big-news/wpath-files

Here are some of the reactions:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13156695/Trans-healthcare-doctors-exposed-admitting-patients-young-mentally-ill-understand-consequences-treatment.html

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/05/wpath-tansgender-hormone-therapy-cancer-links-leaked-emails/

https://sex-matters.org/posts/updates/wpath-the-truth-about-gender-affirming-healthcare/

https://genspect.org/the-wpath-files-revealed/

Here is a summary from Michael Shellenberger.

https://x.com/shellenberger/status/1764800595473686865?s=20
And the first part. Much more of it requires images.

Here is the threadreader version:

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1764799914918490287.html

THE WPATH FILES

Advocates of gender-affirming care say it’s evidence-based.

But now, newly released internal files from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) prove that the practice of transgender medicine is neither scientific nor medical.

American Medical Association, The Endocrine Society, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and thousands of doctors worldwide rely on WPATH. It is considered the leading global authority on gender medicine.

And yet WPATH’s internal files, which include written discussions and a video, reveal that its members know they are creating victims and not getting “informed consent.”

Victims include a 10-year-old girl, a 13-year-old developmentally delayed adolescent, and individuals suffering from schizophrenia and other serious mental illnesses.

The injuries described in the WPATH Files include sterilization, loss of sexual function, liver tumors, and death.

WPATH members indicate repeatedly that they know that many children and their parents don’t understand the effects that puberty blockers, hormones, and surgeries will have on their bodies. And yet, they continue to perform and advocate for gender medicine.

The WPATH Files prove that gender medicine is comprised of unregulated and pseudoscientific experiments on children, adolescents, and vulnerable adults. It will go down as one of the worst medical scandals in history.

Why I Am Publishing WPATH Files And How I Got Them

The written WPATH Files come from WPATH’s member discussion forum, which runs on software provided by DocMatter.

Ninety seconds of the 82-minute video was made public last year. We are making the full video available for the first time.

One or more people gave me the WPATH Files, and my colleagues and I attempted to summarize them as a series of articles. We quickly realized the topic was too sensitive, complex, and large to be dealt with as a work of journalism, and we moved the project to the research institute I founded seven years ago, Environmental Progress (EP).

The Files are authentic. We redacted most names and left only those individuals who are leading gender medicine practitioners to whom we sent “right-of-reply” emails. We know WPATH members discussed our emails internally. No WPATH leader or member has denied that the Files are anything other than what they appear to be.

EP is publishing a 70-page report to provide context for the 170 pages of WPATH Files. Mia Hughes is the author of the report. It and accompanying summary materials can be downloaded at the link below. That link also provides a link to the full WPATH video.

I do, which is why I continue to be horrified by the abject rejection of three decades worth of evidence in order to ban an existing treatment (but only for new patients since it is apparently safe enough to allow existing ones to continue taking it) in order to run a clinical trial that will actively deny a life-saving treatment to half of its participants while pretending they are getting it.

Do you have any idea what that would feel like? Do you understand the inhuman callousness of doing that? What data do they think they're going to get?

Those kids are going to grow up in the full knowledge that they have been callously sacrificed to answer a rhetorical question, not a scientific one.