Times: Chemist sells hormones for kids online

[Malahaha]

I don't think this is a share token. Still haven't mastered the art.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/chemist-sells-hormones-for-trans-children-online-cbgtxlbdr?fbclid=IwAR0ocQdGvaFBfucRwkSlnanlQlhiOi6eH8X3uVprlH7fj8Y-WOSCdoXeOSY

From twitter, it looks like GenderGP are no longer able to use ClearChemist as the regulator has stepped in.

twitter.com/gendergp/status/1313905523335585793?s=21

What does it say?

"thousands of trans patients" according to that tweet.

Jesus. How much must they be making while pronouncing piously about the needs of patients?

I like this twitter response about investigating themselves!

These are their amazingly DARVO tweets from the last hour

GenderGP
@GenderGP
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1h
As a result of the recent negative press attention our prescribing chemist has been told they are unable to fulfil the prescriptions of the thousands of trans patients who use GenderGP.
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GenderGP
@GenderGP
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1h
These changes have been enforced by the Pharmacy Regulator pharmacyregulation.org. We are acutely aware of the distress this is causing our patients. We are currently negotiating with alternative partner pharmacies to ensure our patients healthcare is not affected.
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GenderGP
@GenderGP
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1h
All our patients have been sent an email listing alternative options currently available to them. We are creating an FAQ and will continue to post daily updates as the situation evolves. Live options will be updated here cognitoforms.com/GenderGPOwner/InformationAboutDispensingOptions…
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GenderGP
@GenderGP
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1h
This situation serves to highlight the unacceptable gaps in trans healthcare in the UK. We remain as committed as ever to supporting the trans community.
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GenderGP
@GenderGP
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1h
We believe it is discriminatory that trans people trying to access healthcare are being treated as second class citizens.
We call on everyone to #SupportTransHC #StandWithGGP

I wonder how many of their customers are children?

In case anyone had any doubt about that, UK professional regulators obviously do not shut anyone down because of ‘negative press attention’

Gender GP are talking down to trans patients as though they are stupid. It’s offensive.

I get angry about waiting times on the NHS. I'm sure we all have a personal story about waiting times. One if my children has been waiting some 3 years for mental health support, we've been passed from post to post. She has been suicidal. She's 12. (Not at all related to gen der iden tity). We need better mental health for kids and many of the symptoms tra ns kids get like self harming and suicide need the correct help. I have looked for alternatives for my daughter and she did have some private counselling when we could afford it, but I would never get her drugs off the internet. I understand parents are desparate and I see this on an autism forum I'm in with CBD oil and sleep drugs, but I wouldn't do that without a GP. I feel for these parents but at the same time I just don't understand their urgency and lack of research.

As for them trying to make ‘#StandWithGGP‘ happen.. please.

Interesting that the link to alternative dispensing sites is not available. If the GPhC have stopped one pharmacy from dispensing the scripts how can they expect to be able to arrange it with someone else? How do you negotiate that agreement?
Its interesting that a tweet has a link to the GPhC. I am sure they will love the complaints that they have stopped the dispensing of scripts presumably because there is a question about some aspect of the process. It might not have the result they want.

So I ended up on here because I have been desperately seeking information about what's going to happen with my prescription. I've been taking hormones (as I'm trans) for 18 months. I'm pretty scared to have got the email today from GGP telling me that medication that I need due to my medical diagnosis suddenly might be unavailable to me. Can you imagine if that was happening to you with medication you have finally found to have treated a long-term condition that you've suffered with for decades?

I'm really stunned to see folks here being smug and downright unpleasant, whilst so many of us are actually in a really horrible position now.

I'd much rather not have had to go privately, but the NHS waiting list is super long, due to underfunding of the service. If you want trans people to be seen within the NHS (and most of us would far far prefer that too!) the best thing you can do is to campaign for better provision within NHS.

Additionally treatment that gives us an actual chance of life. I had poor mental health for decades, and seen therapists at various times, been on anti depressants etc. Until finally decided to stop trying to push down my gender feels and transition. I didn't want to be trans, I don't want to face the horrible way folks talk about us. I don't want to spend so much time and money accessing healthcare. I'd much rather be cis. But I also know how I have felt for decades, how unhappy I've been about my body and gendering. I have tried everything I can think of to be content with it, but never found a solution that actually worked. Until I decided to go ahead with the transition I'd first started thinking about in my early twenties.

GenderGP is affordable. And treated me with compassion, empathy and dignity. That is why I use them. They saved me and hundreds, prob thousands of people from years of unhappiness, and allowed us to get the healthcare we needed without having to go through 3-4 year waiting lists. I was 44 when I started transitioning, I'd wasted 20 years of my life with terrible mental health. The thought of losing my 40s as well as my 20s and 30s was unbearable.

(excuse typos. i not long finished a 12 hour shift at work and have been trying to find out what to do about my meds, and was even more upset after reading this thread)

Alex I am genuinely sorry that consenting adults like you have got caught in the cross-fire of this battle.

But you are an adult. It may be difficult for you, but there are alternative avenues, which you, having adult levels of cognition and mental capacity, can explore. I sincerely hope you will be able to find someone in this country who can help you - and in this instance, organisations like Stonewall should be able to give you support and guidance in this (that is if they still do practical, meaningful real-world support for LGBT people rather than just twitter posturing).

However, the reason most of us on this board are so opposed to GenderGP is because they prescribe these medicines to children, who do not yet have the intellectual capacity or life experience to enable them to give any sort of consent, much less informed consent, to life-altering, irreversible medical treatments.

If GenderGP had confined their attention to adults with full mental capacity, I might have suspected them of being rapacious, money grabbing bastards, but I wouldn't have tried to stop them doing that.

I was a teenager once, and if I'd had access to treatment then it would have been much more effective than anything I can do now.

Teenagers are considered able to consent to medical treatments and operations all the time. If you would rather have it done within NHS, with that safeguarding, great. But pushing folks out of nhs by eg targeting tavistock will obviously end up with desperate people seeking healthcare from private providers.

'I am genuinely sorry that consenting adults like you have got caught in the cross-fire of this battle" Thank you for acknowledging that. In the comments above all i saw were folks crowing. There really are thousands of us who are now deeply worried about accessing our medications :(

The problem is that Keira Bell was also a teenager - one who, as it turned out, was not trans. And the medical practitioners were unable to tell the difference. Which is why "first do no harm" has to be the guiding principle.

Good luck with your search for an alternative (and hopefully more reputable) source of medical help.

Hi Alex thanks for coming on here to give your perspective and I'm another who feels genuinely sad for people like you that have been impacted.

You say how your experience as a child/teenager has shaped your view and many of us on here have also been shaped by our childhood experiences. We know that had we been offered the option of changing gender as children, we would have jumped at it. That thought scares the hell out of us and is the reason we don't want that path available for our children or grandchildren. We are honestly not evil, we just passionately believe in protecting children.

Good luck with finding an alternative provider.

Hi Alex, good to hear your perspective. I'm sympathetic to your situation as I (like many other women) am forced to buy thyroid hormones online as the NHS will only provide T4 (which makes me sick) and I need T3+T4 to feel like a normal person. It's expensive and causes a lot of trouble as online pharmacy disappear and reappear and you worry about how you are going to keep going without your life saving medication.

However, I am an adult. I would never advocate for children to be buying hormones online. If GenderGP were only prescribing to adults, it wouldn't be a problem but prescribing to kids is really wrong.

Reddit transgender communities are talking about being cut off from thier prescriptions because of this article.

www.reddit.com/r/transgenderUK/comments/j6qwk9/just_received_this_email_from_gendergp/

This isn't good for anybody. Yes, there should have been a conversation had and yes they refused to talk about it. But cold turkey cut off for adults with gender dysphoria seems inhumane to me.

@Betheanne

Reddit transgender communities are talking about being cut off from thier prescriptions because of this article.

www.reddit.com/r/transgenderUK/comments/j6qwk9/just_received_this_email_from_gendergp/

This isn't good for anybody. Yes, there should have been a conversation had and yes they refused to talk about it. But cold turkey cut off for adults with gender dysphoria seems inhumane to me.

I'm sure Gender GP knew this and knew the upset it would cause for their thousands of customers. It's a shame they didn't do anything about it.

It's been stopped because the regulator stepped in and concerns were also raised by insurers.

There is an article in this tweet that gives the regulator position. mobile.twitter.com/ICPmagazine/status/1313884716689494016

The regulator, however, urged pharmacies to “manage the extra risks” that may arise when working with a prescriber based outside the UK and ensure “the prescriber is working within national prescribing guidelines for the UK.”

“People are at risk of serious harm if they receivemedicinesor treatmentthat arenot clinically appropriate forthem,” said GPhC chief executive Duncan Rudkin.

“(The) investigation by the BBC andThe Timesraises serious concerns. Wearelooking into the issues raised as a matter of urgency and will take any actions necessary to safeguard patients and the public. Pharmacy owners and pharmacy professionals have a responsibility to safeguard children and vulnerable people.

“We expect pharmacy owners to make sure they do not work with online providers who are trying to circumvent the regulatory oversight put in place within the UK to ensure patient safety throughout the healthcare system.

‎“Pharmacy owners should also make sure that theonline prescribing service, or a prescriber, thattheychoose to work with is aware that some categories of medicines are not suitable to be supplied online unless further safeguards have been put in place to make sure that they are clinically appropriate.

“This includes medicines that require ongoing monitoring and management.”

Teenagers are considered able to consent to medical treatments and operations all the time. If you would rather have it done within NHS, with that safeguarding, great. But pushing folks out of nhs by eg targeting tavistock will obviously end up with desperate people seeking healthcare from private providers.

I stopped being sympathetic at this point.

All medical practice (NHS or private) needs to be ethically above board, and if people taking action to investigate concerns in that regard are "targeting" them, then you're arguing for the total deregulation of medicine.

If there is no regulation then how can we protect people from making potentially devastating decisions?

When dad was diagnosed with a terminal illness the number of ‘cures’ my brother found on the interned was quite amazing. All ‘genuine’ and ‘proven’ apparently - just awaiting paperwork. There is still no cure...

I'm glad action has been taken against Gender GP. It should be working within the regulations, if it were, this wouldn't be happening. Trying to circumvent the rules to put children on an irreversible medical pathway, unnecessarily, is abhorrent and I hope they spend a long time in prison.

It’s not kind or responsible to let desperate people buy ineffective or dangerous snake oil. It’s exploitative and cynical.

That’s why we have statutory health care regulation, with its legal foundations debated democratically in Parliament.