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

And I should add, that 2011 study should not have been approved either. There never was any need or clinical justification for experimenting on children like this. It was done due to pressure from activists and an attitude of resignation among medics that affirming parents would just take their kids to the Netherlands or USA if they said no.

Do you disagree with Baroness Cass who has said on-record that:

-She hopes that for those "where there is a clear, clinical view" that the medical pathway is best will still receive that.
-She emphasised that a medical pathway, with lifetime implications and treatment, required caution but "it's really important to say that a cis outcome and a trans outcome have equal value"
-She expressed concern that her review was being weaponized to suggest that trans people do not exist, saying "that's really disappointing to me that that happens, because that's absolutely not what we're saying." She also clarified that her review was not about defining what trans means or rolling back health care, stating "There are young people who absolutely benefit from a medical pathway, and we need to make sure that those young people have access — under a research protocol, because we need to improve the research — but not assume that that's the right pathway for everyone."

Because it sounds like you do and I would like to understand your stance clearly.

Wow. I did not know that.

Well I would tend to agree, but the point is that even the people who think they can turn a penis into a vagina agree that you can't do it if you only have a child sized penis to work with.

I'd actually forgotten that @NotAGentleReminder but I do remember this now. Very important point.

Long-time lurker on this board and rarely post due to burnout so apologies in advance if my replies to this are delayed/brief. But anyway, no one so far (and apologies if I have missed it and someone has pointed it out) has acknowledged that there has already been a clinical trial of puberty blockers on children - the GIDS 2011 trial that absolutely was approved by ethics committee, with the researchers knowing the likely harms when they proposed it. It was rejected by the first ethics committee but approved by a second committee which almost unbelievably was of the researchers' choosing. Despite an increase in suicidality being observed a year into the study, and before the study had even been completed, prescription of puberty blockers for 'gender' reasons was introduced as standard practice. Publication of this study was delayed by years, no positive outcomes were identified. When anyone asks about long-term follow-up of these children there are tumbleweeds. The adult clinics refused to release their data for the Cass review which could have provided useful information on long-term outcomes. Doing more trials on children where some healthy children have their normal pubertal development disrupted and endocrine disturbance induced is completely unethical as well as unnecessary as far as I'm concerned and that this was a recommendation of the Cass review is so disappointing. She even addresses children directly in the review asking them to join the studies to help those who come after. Doctors already know suppressing normal puberty (ie not precocious, ie abnormally early puberty, and they even have to be very selective and treat for the shortest time possible when managing those cases) is harmful so I really don't know how further experiments are needed to prove this is the case before the medical profession says no. It's all backwards. You don't do a study to prove an intervention you already know to be inappropriate, harmful and unethical is indeed inappropriate, harmful and unethical so that you can prove to those demanding it that it's no good so will not be available, sacrificing selected children in order to do so and telling them they are helping those coming after them. I can only hope it is rejected by ethics committee this time but have serious concerns it will go ahead.

@ButterflyHatched , I am quoting @NotBadConsidering deliberately to get you to comment specifically on this:

"The best individual outcome is for a person to receive therapy for their body dysmorphia, come to terms with the fact they can’t change sex and they have to deal with the body they have, and accept that body modification doesn’t help and risks a myriad of health problems. To anyone sensible, this is win-win for everyone. And it’s achievable. Because it’s happened. It’s just that too many clinicians have taken the easy way out and foregone appropriate treatment because it’s in the too hard basket."

Coming to terms with your distress is the ONLY path forward. Medication, surgery, will never, ever make the pain go away.

Take a page out of the buddhists book.

One small quibble, there is no such thing as a successful vaginoplasty. You cannot create a vagina in a man. Not a proper functioning one.

First trans person I met was a trans guy - and that's the same for quite a few of my vintage. Media portrayals had an effect of letting people know treatment was available and that, combined with the visibility of trans women more generally and the stark realities that made apparent for treatment windows, meant male-assigned transitioners were over represented early on.

At the end of the day, this is about safety and the best possible individual outcome isn't it?

Isn't it?

Yes.

That's why:

a) data should be available from the 9000 patients who have already had this treatment. It's a valid use of the public task exemption from GDPR. If the harms/benefits are unknown, it's unethical not to do this.

https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-resources/lawful-basis/a-guide-to-lawful-basis/lawful-basis-for-processing/public-task/?q=proportionate

b) parents should not be treated as a risk to their children if they are doing everything they can to stop their child being part of what could best be described as a medical experiment. The temporary, then indefinite, ban has stopped the experiment running wild but a new trial, when the stakes are equally as high as they were to justify that ban, is simply not ethical.

I'm not a member of Bayswater parents' group (and we haven't yet stopped our daughter accessing the internet) but I absolutely recognise the despair of parents in the forum that's described appallingly badly in this article that I stumbled upon recently:

https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2024-07-02/one-day-they-may-thank-us-for-that-abuse-inside-the-bayswater-support-group/

If we've got the Tory and Labour parties recognising that the safety and efficacy of puberty blockers is unknown (and we're already seeing healthcare recognising that this applies to cross-sex hormones) and we've got schools and social media telling children that they can be their authentic selves by following this pathway, that anyone who denies them this is a danger to them (including their own parents), Social Services being told that parents are "abusers" etc... who could blame a parent who feels unheard sharing ideas with others? Perhaps destroying their daughter's breast binder is all they could think of to fight against this tide of institutionalised activism.

I welcome conclusive evidence that puberty blockers are catastrophically harmful and do not address gender incongruence. I would be very confused since it would not in any way match my own experiences, but if those turn out to be the findings then something must have caused them.

Your discrepancies in your accounts of having a condition that meant you didn’t progress through puberty and also received puberty blockers at a late age, 17, mean your individual experience counts for little in terms of confusion in relation to outcomes of children puberty blocked earlier, at the ages of 12 or so.

And even despite that, in practically every clinical trial there are outcomes that aren’t the same. It’s not “confusing” it’s part of the evidence. If only 0.1% of children out of puberty blockers are helped, congratulations on being that 0.1%, but the other 99.9% weren’t. This isn’t “confusing”, is it?

What we do from there is important. Saint Cass herself said we should not consider trans and non-trans outcomes in a biased fashion and people should get treatment if they need it.

”Saint Cass.” Pathetic. Biased fashion. What treatment? What treatment do they need? Watching and waiting and supporting through difficult times is treatment. It has better outcomes.

If it is not safe to completely suppress puberty then we may still be able to gain some beneficial effects from partial suppression using a specific medication profile.

This isn’t possible.

It may strengthen the case for earlier interventions with CSH for patients who have a clear clinical need and where PB's aren't with a safe window.

Yes, of course, while all the focus is on puberty blockers, let’s just ignore the incredible harms from wrong sex hormones and pretend putting children on them earlier isn’t also going to cause massive problems 🙄.

There is no safe window for wrong sex hormones either. Cancer, heart disease, liver disease, early death. Given you have a myriad of health problems you’ve admitted to, you’re not naive to the fact that you’re on a pathway to significant morbidity and a shortened lifespan as a result of decades of wrong sex hormones, so why are you so desperate to get kids on them sooner?

At the end of the day, this is about safety and the best possible individual outcome isn't it?

The best individual outcome is for a person to receive therapy for their body dysmorphia, come to terms with the fact they can’t change sex and they have to deal with the body they have, and accept that body modification doesn’t help and risks a myriad of health problems. To anyone sensible, this is win-win for everyone. And it’s achievable. Because it’s happened. It’s just that too many clinicians have taken the easy way out and foregone appropriate treatment because it’s in the too hard basket.

Instead, let’s commit children to a lifetime of medical misery instead🙄

None, that was my point. There must have been something behind the massive and rapid increase. If it was from seeing happy adult transmen, how did such an increase happen in 7 years? They can't all have been those 15 girls from 2009.

And it's an excellent point @JazzyJelly

None, that was my point. There must have been something behind the massive and rapid increase. If it was from seeing happy adult transmen, how did such an increase happen in 7 years? They can't all have been those 15 girls from 2009.

Some people choose to treat their gender dysphoria and others choose to let it fester all their lives. Sometimes it does ease, or at least get easier. Other times it reaches a crisis point. There are healthy coping strategies and there are extremely unhealthy ones as well - the same brand of virulent self-denial that leads to people unconvincingly proclaiming themselves to be Ex-Gay, for example.

That's so scary. I can easily imagine being one of these girls if I'd been born a decade later. It was all self harm as you say when I was young.

Very creepy of adults (especially men, what's it got to do with them?) to push this on children! I'm very glad I wasn't of this generation and grew up to have a (fairly) healthy female body.

Cass is a paediatrician, not a feminist. We never expected her to consider the issue from the same angle many of us do here on FWR. But I'm sure she's had an insight into what this movement is really about, given the amount of abuse and violent rhetoric aimed at her by unhinged activists, just for producing a scientific review they didn't like.

How many trans men did you know in 2009?

How many did you see on tv?

How many did you see in daily life?

Most female-assigned trans kids in 2009 still had no idea transition was even something the NHS supported. It was all still 'hurrhurr look how ugly that trans woman is' punchlines and occasional tragedy porn.

I know loads of those men now. They felt what they felt throughout childhood and transitioned as soon as they knew it was even an option for them.

You're quite right, it was wrong to canonise someone who caused immense harm to desperate vulnerable children and whose legacy continues to do so, regardless of the pseudo-religious following they may have gained.

She's already fallen from grace anyway. Didn't go far enough, and now her words are becoming quite a shackle aren't they?

Social contagion via online is a massive issue. These girls have been gaslit into believing their bodies are flawed but a sex change is the cure by adult male dominated groups. They don't give a fuck about the welfare of teenage girls but use them for their own validation.
We know how toxic social contagion is with mental health disorders (eating, self harm etc) but society has been conned into allowing these people to gaslight our children.

Blimey, what an increase in referrals to GIDS from that article! 15 adolescent females in 2009, to 1,071 in 2016!

Why are teen girls so unhappy with their bodies, and why do they think the solution is to appear male instead?

Thank you.

Yes, I do. 💐

Ironically, after an initially terrible start, CAMHS ended up being a positive experience for us on this (I have written about some of this on other threads). The counselling service I was liaising with is via a CAMHS referral. That's one of the reasons that my daughter wants to stick with it, because she built up a trust with how she was being supported. But....

I don't think they are safe for your daughter either given what they have said to you.

Neither do I. Frustratingly, I've likely now also got more of an uphill battle to demonstrate why I'm not just an unreasonable, anxious parent etc etc.

"Saint Cass" Never misses an opportunity to sneer about a woman 🙄

"Recruitment for the trial is due to start in 2025, months later than originally anticipated. Young people will likely be referred after a full assessment by specialist clinicians. A lot is still to be determined, including how many participants there will be.

Ultimately the scientists running the trials will need to establish whether people who get an intervention are better off than those who do not. In this case, do the puberty blocking drugs and their effect make the young people better off?

"Better off" in this instance includes the extent to which a young person's mental health may be improved if they are happy with their body. Quality of life is determined by various factors including self-confidence and self-esteem. As well as getting the personal views from the young people and parents, the trial could measure actual real life changes, such as time spent in education and time spent with family and friends.

But there are potential harms to study too, such as the possibility of reduced bone density. Some scientists suggest examining the impact on learning using a form of IQ test.Normal brain development is influenced by both puberty and chronological age, which usually act in tandem during adolescence. It's not clear how this is affected when puberty is suppressed. Brain scans are one way of understanding any effect.

Some scientists believe it may be possible to simply randomly assign trial participants into two groups where one gets puberty blockers, the other gets a placebo and nobody is aware which group they're in.But others believe a placebo group is impossible. They say the placebo group would go through puberty, realise they weren't on puberty blockers and potentially drop out of the trial or even find other ways to obtain puberty blockers. Either scenario would reduce the validity of the results.

Professor Gordon Guyatt and others have outlined a potential trial where the group of patients not receiving drugs would be made up entirely of children who are keen to socially transition, such as by changing how they dress and altering their name and pronouns. Researchers could then monitor the difference between the groups.

A second possibility is that both trial groups are given puberty blockers but one group gets them after a delay, during which time they receive psychological and emotional support. This would help researchers determine, among other things, whether their gender-related distress subsides during that delay while receiving the support.

Alongside this there would be a "matched" control group that doesn't take a placebo or puberty blockers, whether for health reasons or because they don't want to, that get similar tests and scans"

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyd2qe5kkjo

From the BBC... 3 days ago

Do you care about the evidence though? It sounds like you are lining up your 'the clinics are all compromised' dismissal already.

I welcome conclusive evidence that puberty blockers are catastrophically harmful and do not address gender incongruence. I would be very confused since it would not in any way match my own experiences, but if those turn out to be the findings then something must have caused them.

What we do from there is important. Saint Cass herself said we should not consider trans and non-trans outcomes in a biased fashion and people should get treatment if they need it.

If it is not safe to completely suppress puberty then we may still be able to gain some beneficial effects from partial suppression using a specific medication profile.

It may strengthen the case for earlier interventions with CSH for patients who have a clear clinical need and where PB's aren't with a safe window.

At the end of the day, this is about safety and the best possible individual outcome isn't it?

Isn't it?