Woman's Hour today is interviewing someone from the Tavistock about puberty blockers

[nauticant]

It'll be interesting to get a sense of how Emma Barnett thinks the discussion should be handled.

Excellent interview. How can anyone ignore his sensible cautious approach.

I thought that meant they'd dodged the issue of how many go onto pharmacological interventions by quoting the surgical instead. 'Physical interventions' is a bit ambiguous.

It would be awesome if Radio Mumsnet existed! Can you imagine?

m.youtube.com/watch?v=s29RKnB7l7o

Can we play this on mumsnet radio for Nigel?

I'd listen to Radio Mumsnet.

Could someone have a word with Justine?

@steppemum

pity she read out that VERY LOOOONG statement from Tavistock with no come back. Some of what is in that statement is obviously not what is happening on the ground

But it is right that the whole thing was read out. That way everyone has been given their say.

That's one key point ErrolTheDragon, they dodged the issue of how many go onto pharmacological interventions.

Here's what they actually said:

"[The Tavistock] have always been confident that fewer than half of children [the Tavistock] see go on to have physical treatment."

"Physical treatment" is a euphemism used to make unclear what's going on.

The Tavistock statement is worth a close listen:
"the Gender Identity Development Service was not set up as a conduit to puberty blockers", to suggest this is "inaccurate" and "insulting".
"most often this does not include access to physical treatment in the service." "in the service" is another way of saying "not me guv".
"the minority of our patients who are referred to puberty blockers prescribed by other NHS trusts". More "not me guv".

Notice what's missing, it's cross-sex hormones. They really do not want to engage with the fact that, as the High Court found, puberty blockers lead to cross-sex hormones. Ask yourself this question, if nearly all kids given puberty blockers end up on cross-sex hormones, and fewer than half of all kids given puberty blockers end up having "physical treatment", why are the Tavistock avoiding discussing the significant proportion of kids given puberty blockers who end up in gender limbo, with opposite sex secondary sexual characteristics (to some degree) but for some reason without going on any further in their transitions?

Does anyone know what's been wiped from the recording at about 11:55mins?

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000s2jx

There’s no follow up once they leave the Tavi anyway and an awful lot of adolescents age out of the Tavi before they are even seen (i.e. go directly to adult services) so how they can come up with any reliable statistics is beyond me.

During the live broadcast there were a few seconds where the audio died ItsAllGoingToBeFine.

Ah ok, that's a tad unprofessional from the BBC Glad it wasn't a redaction.

Excellent that so much time was given to this without interruption and interventions from Emma. I think the Tavistock response was defensive and this was clearly an attempt to justify the past , which was so cleverly exposed by Dr Bell. I thought Emma sounded a bit desperate in putting forward the other view.

The bit about transgender Vs gender dysphoria was interesting. The Tavistock said

gender dysphoria and being transgender are quite clearly different things. We have often said that gender dysphoria is in fact a poor predictor for who goes on to transition. Gender dysphoria may resolve in a number of ways. This is what the exploration that the service does with young people is concerned with, respecting young people's dysphoric feelings or your self identification does not mean that assumptions are made about how this may evolve over time or what support or treatment may be appropriate.

My understanding was that puberty blockers were a medical treatment for the diagnosable condition of gender dysphoria. They seem to be saying that actually they give medication to lots of children who aren't dysphoric, but are just trans. What are the diagnostic criteria for that?

"Gender dysphoria is a poor predictor for who goes on to transition"??

I mean, I get that not all with GD go on to transition. But are we meant to believe that those without GD are more-or-less equally likely to transition, and that this is fine?

This is where there's a huge disconnect between the popular "poor things, suffering from having been born in the wrong body" narrative, and the ideas that are now coming out of various ivory towers (who are themselves riding on the coattails of the popular narrative).

Transgender without gender dysphoria was one of my first big WTF! moments.

Since then the narrative has developed that transgender people don't have to have gender dysphoria, they can have gender euphoria instead. You only need to think about the latter for a few seconds before the lightbulb comes on.

But are we meant to believe that those without GD are more-or-less equally likely to transition, and that this is fine?

That's how I interpreted it, but I may well have misheard or misunderstood. Perhaps the Tavi meant they only deal with gender dysphoric children and not trans children without dysphoria? That does seem more likely.

Can we play this on mumsnet radio for Nigel?

My plans for Nigel would include cutting off his WiFi and sending him some second wave feminist texts.

OP

"Here's what they actually said:

"[The Tavistock] have always been confident that fewer than half of children [the Tavistock] see go on to have physical treatment."

"Physical treatment" is a euphemism used to make unclear what's going on."

...

"Ask yourself this question, if nearly all kids given puberty blockers end up on cross-sex hormones, and fewer than half of all kids given puberty blockers end up having "physical treatment"

I think they mean for example, 100 kids a referred to Gids. Fewer than 50 are prescribed some kind of physical intervention which in most cases is initially puberty blockers. The remaining children (more than 50) get no medical intervention at all, only psychological or other support.

But some of those fifty referred for puberty blockers and further medical treatment do not have a medical condition?

And yes, those who are prescribed are actually referred to other trusts to do it, and it is a bit 'not me gov' to make a thing of this.

Itsallgoingtibefine I didn't hear it so am just going off the transcript here of the statement, but I don't see where it says some children without gd will be referred for the physical intervention? They are saying gd resolves in a number of ways - ie it can resolve without the medical route.

I'm confused. If the children don't have gender Dysphoria, are they still treating them?

Thanks for that alternative interpretation Manderleyagain. It isn't clear but you might be right that the Tavistock is saying that giving drugs, whether PBs or hormones, is a "physical treatment".

gender dysphoria and being transgender are quite clearly different things. We have often said that gender dysphoria is in fact a poor predictor for who goes on to transition. Gender dysphoria may resolve in a number of ways. This is what the exploration that the service does with young people is concerned with, respecting young people's dysphoric feelings or your self identification does not mean that assumptions are made about how this may evolve over time or what support or treatment may be appropriate.

They say children without gender dysphoria still go onto transition. So what does transition mean in that context?

They then speculate about what treatment might be appropriate for a child based self ID? What the fuck? What treatment would you give a child whose self ID's without any dysphoria?

Perhaps we should contact our MPs to request greater funding for CAMHS - Dr Bell stayed this was the way to treat gender dysphasia initially.