I like this comment posted on the times - no child can truly understand the long-term effects of this treatment, they can't have the required life experience because they have never been an adult.
I hope Keira Bell wins this case. Either way, she has been remarkably courageous in taking the matter to court.
The Gillick test of capacity arose in the context of whether a girl aged under 16 could be prescribed contraception without parental consent. Whilst there are issues about a child under the age of consent using contraception, the most likely outcome is an avoided pregnancy, which most people would see as desirable & unlikely to affect the child’s entire life. Not so with hormones blockers. The evidence that they are reversible is poor. The Tavistock has never published in full its findings from its clinical trial on the matter, a clear breach of the conditions under which approval was given for the trial. The evidence which has been published indicates various physical harms, eg lack of bone density at a critical stage of growth, issues with cognitive development & an absence of reduction in mental distress. The vast majority who use hormone blockers move on to take cross sex hormones which clearly cause irreversible changes. The result is that a child taking hormone blockers is effectively placed on a conveyor to a life time of medical treatment chasing the fantasy of sex change, which can never be delivered as a biological reality.
In my mind, a child who has yet to reach full sexual maturity, and might not have had any sexual experience, cannot possibly have the capacity consent to such a course. It is literally life changing. To uncritically encourage a child down this route, especially without adequate assessment of the causes of their dysphoria & consideration of a range of options to alleviate it, is child abuse. All the more so in cases involving autism or apparent rapid onset gender dysphoria.