COVID test consent forms asking for gender

[accessorizequeen]

I’ve just had to complete forms for my dc at two different secondary schools to consent for them to receive COVID testing. One form asked for Gender and the other for Gender at birth. Neither asked for sex. Can anyone suggest the best way to raise my objection to this conflation of gender with sex. The data is not being recorded properly and there’s no such thing as gender at birth. Who would be behind the form design?

I usually just cross out gender and write sex

I had the same in an online form (so no opportunity to cross out the wrong word).

I had this a while ago with Virgin Healthcare on the immunisation consent forms and wrote to them about it - I received a load of mumbo jumbo in response. I haven't chased further but noticed that they still haven't changed it

I have encountered this in a professional capacity.

I registered a biologically female child for a Covid test. Their gender identity is 'male'. They have been identifying as 'male' for less than a month. I took advice, and was told to register as their chosen gender.

So a pre-teen biologically female child is registered for a medical test, as a male.

I have raised my objections.

(I am being incredibly careful with my words here so might come across as clinical! I am actually somewhere between raging and distraught.)

The form comes from the Government. Your school might have had an administrator make up a version in whatever format is easiest for them to process, but the wording will be lifted directly from the government based form (which asks for 'gender').

If one of your schools has altered it to 'gender at birth' maybe you have GC admin staff who are trying to get round the issue! They can't change it to 'sex'. Just like they can't change the wording of the ethnicity categories the gov form asks for, or the wording of the various consents.

Please please please write to the school and raise your objections. They need to know. And also write to your MP. We need all of us to write in. This isn't going to be addressed if no one talks about it.

@Selfraising

I have encountered this in a professional capacity.

I registered a biologically female child for a Covid test. Their gender identity is 'male'. They have been identifying as 'male' for less than a month. I took advice, and was told to register as their chosen gender.

So a pre-teen biologically female child is registered for a medical test, as a male.

I have raised my objections.

(I am being incredibly careful with my words here so might come across as clinical! I am actually somewhere between raging and distraught.)

Why did you take such bad advice?

@Selfraising

I have encountered this in a professional capacity.

I registered a biologically female child for a Covid test. Their gender identity is 'male'. They have been identifying as 'male' for less than a month. I took advice, and was told to register as their chosen gender.

So a pre-teen biologically female child is registered for a medical test, as a male.

I have raised my objections.

(I am being incredibly careful with my words here so might come across as clinical! I am actually somewhere between raging and distraught.)

That's incredible.

I think asking advice on this is actually a great idea as well as recoding the advice has been sought. The more the buck passes UP the more this might be discussed amongst those with more power in these situations.

That's admittedly somewhat optimistic thinking though because obviously the person who gave the advice believes sex is something that automatically changes according to the day's gender ID.

Same here. Form must have been designed by school as they set up ggole forms us style dates - which is going to really mess their data up!

Secondary school applications ask for gender in the London wide application (two years ago but I expect is still the case).

I've filled in lot sir forms over the past few weeks for children and elderly relatives and TBH most had gender (one had sex and I can't recall but I was surprised(

I did suspect the forms might have been based on a government template. Why are the govt (or specifically the Dept of Health and Social Care) recording gender but not sex?

I didn't feel like I had much choice. I raised it, I asked, I got a response, I challenged the response, I got another response. I said I was unhappy for xyz reasons, I said this needs more thought, and I requested that they feed this back higher. In the meantime, I had a child to register before a test could be done.

I feel defensive reading your response to be honest. What do you think I should have done? Taken advice and then done my own thing anyway? Or just ticked 'female' and then never have fed back?

I can't tell you how much I would have loved to tick 'female'. Maybe I should have done. But it didn't seem like I could at the time.

They record sex when you get the actual Covid jab - well they did in my area when I booked my first one.

The asked for gender on the Covid job form in my area. Crossed it out and put sex.

When registering interest in the UK vaccine challenge trials, they ask for gender too! (I would have thought it vital to get accurate information for the trials, hopefully they accurately record sex at a later point but it hardly inspires confidence).

Oh dear

@Selfraising

I didn't feel like I had much choice. I raised it, I asked, I got a response, I challenged the response, I got another response. I said I was unhappy for xyz reasons, I said this needs more thought, and I requested that they feed this back higher. In the meantime, I had a child to register before a test could be done.

I feel defensive reading your response to be honest. What do you think I should have done? Taken advice and then done my own thing anyway? Or just ticked 'female' and then never have fed back?

I can't tell you how much I would have loved to tick 'female'. Maybe I should have done. But it didn't seem like I could at the time.

There was nothing more you could have done.

Selfraising
I think you were right to ask for advice... these issues need to be passed back up the line so they know there are problems.

The covid test consent form I received from school said gender with 3 options female, male, non-binary. I didn’t answer it for ages but now they are going back I felt that I had to.

I decided to try submitting the form without filling in the gender question and it did actually submit. This was a relief to me although the note did say all fields must be filled in I felt that I had sidestepped the being forced to participate in something I don’t believe in bit.

For the ethnicity question there was a “prefer not to say” option. I don’t know why gender couldn’t have the same options although “none” would be most accurate.

Aren’t they breaking some sort of data collection law by collecting irrelevant data? No school child has a GRC and non-binary isn’t a legally valid category anyway is it?

Just how is a child’s internal subjective feeling of gender relevant to anything medical?

I felt angry that I was being forced to declare a gender identity on behalf of my DC. I don’t want to start a conversation along the lines of you know we are all obliged to have a gender identity now so you need to have a think and choose one...

If forced then the only option I can choose for myself and my daughters is non binary because who in her right mind would sign up for female stereotypes yet I actually believe that biological sex is the only relevant factor. Gender stereotypes have always been imposed on us, now this ideology takes it to a whole new level, we are being left no way to be women other than by signing up for stereotypes.

This is absolutely the imposition of belief. It is outrageous.

They don’t ask for other beliefs or star signs or any psychological personality test results.

Both tests required Gender to be submitted but I could use “prefer not to say” on one form and add text on the other. So I wrote “You’re confusing sex with gender”. Don’t know if that was the way to go! I have asked for advice elsewhere about the GDPR ramifications. Always easier to challenge on grounds like that instead of getting into ideology.

Our lateral flow test consent form had Gender: male/female.
I crossed it out put sex. Then wrote that though this would have been technically incorrect but perfectly reasonable several years ago, that the current controversial climate surrounding gender and sex means that gender is now interpretted as gender identity, which is irrelevant to covid testing and medical contexts in general.

I assumed it was just lazy use of gender in an interchangable way on a standardised form, but it sounds like it is each school doing their own forms if one school had a non binary option.

Crossed mine out, put sex, added please do not enforce on me a political belief that I do not hold.

I've had two different forms for two different secondary schools, neither asked for sex or gender so I assume it was not compulsory?

I have to take a Covid Test regularly and I put the results on an NHS website. It asks for my gender, there is no other option. I so pissed off.

Covid 19 has killed a higher percentage of men. So knowing gender at birth (if you want to use that phrase) is important. To know how good the vaccines are in keeping people out of hospital (men or women).

The covid test consent form I received from school said gender with 3 options female, male, non-binary.

If one of the options is non-binary, why are they asking the question?

So knowing gender at birth (if you want to use that phrase) is important.

^^
Eh???? I had - and still have - a sex at birth. Never had a gender.

So knowing gender at birth (if you want to use that phrase) is important.

I know that there is a whole world of people who use gender and sex interchangeably, but schools, who are responsible for teaching PSHE should be on top of this.

Sex is relevant to covid. Gender isn't.