Harper review: hormone transition in change body composition, muscle strength and haemoglobin?

[Winesalot]

Haven’t seen this posted yet. It was published 1 March 2020 and seems to not have been loudly heralded in its arrival. That in itself is telling.

‘How does hormone transition in transgender women change body composition, muscle strength and haemoglobin? ‘

bjsm.bmj.com/content/early/2021/02/28/bjsports-2020-103106

Conclusion In transwomen, hormone therapy rapidly reduces Hgb to levels seen in cisgender women. In contrast, hormone therapy decreases strength, LBM and muscle area, yet values remain above that observed in cisgender women, even after 36 months. These findings suggest that strength may be well preserved in transwomen during the first 3 years of hormone therapy.

So, yet another study that repeats what has been shown already. There are benefits due to androgens in male puberty that are not reversed with transition.

I will read the study if I can today to see what other points are brought out and to see what other studies might have been included in this review.

If others are still writing to sporting bodies, this may be (as I said, I have not read it in full) a good one to include. Particularly pertinent for GB cycling team and a newly transitioned champion with regards for the upcoming Olympics.

Thanks OP. Hopefully this will let in a little more light

Thanks for sharing this.

It's not getting as much attention as Harper's previous "research" on eight runners who had slower times up to 20 years later (no shit, they were 20years older) that the IOC took so seriously.

I hope they will pay attention to this one.

I think this has been mentioned on here somewhere. I can't remember which thread.

I saw Emma Hilton tweeting about it the other day.

I'm sure it will get ignored in the wider world for not fitting the narrative.

I am going to suggest that this conclusion proves uncomfortable for those suggesting that previous papers on these same studies were suspect because of the authors and so were discounted time and time again....yet, here we are, a researcher known for a paper that has been deemed as credible despite very poor methodology being used for setting policy at IOC level, publishing a conclusion that is the same as Dr Hilton and Tommy Lundberg.

I will just make one more point. Yesterday a poster stated it was pointless to post evidence that backed their argument. It was pointed out that if evidence is robust, it should withstand scrutiny from different perspectives.

Just like these studies and conclusions.

The evidence shows that the inclusion of people who have benefited from male puberty in any way, should not be competing in women’s sports. If down the track a way to mitigate that benefit is discovered, then it will be time to reconsider. As world rugby has stated they will do.

The exclusion of Transwomen from women’s sport does not exclude them from playing sport. They can play with their own sex and should be encouraged to do this with focused programs and to play or compete in mixed sex matches/events etc.

WanderinWomb

Yes. Maybe this study might restore some credibility to Harper after that travesty of a study with methodology issues so obvious to ignore.

There’s a new CEO at British Cycling who asked members to write to him so we have and pointed out how unfair their Transgender Policy is on women.
British Cycling also committed to reviewing that policy annually so this paper will be shoved under their noses by us.
The big downside is they recently announced their new Diversity and Inclusion board which contains Robbie de Santos from Stonewall and former pro cyclist, KOM winner who later transitioned Robert Millar/Pippa York.

I’d saw this blog on Twitter regarding Harper and their first paper. I wish I’d been at the conference.
notthenewsinbriefs.wordpress.com/2019/04/09/who-really-influenced-the-ioc/

I wonder if Sport England have finished their review on trans inclusion in sport yet? they've been very quiet about the results if they have....

I enjoyed that link Quadzilla. I would have heaps more to say but I have been informed on numerous occasions that my style lacks what it takes to ensure civil discourse. Twice told and aiming to not be told a final time. So, I will leave it and resort to posing polite questions in the Socratic style. Another thing I have learned from Dr Emma Hilton.

Kit I’m also interested in Sport England. Their submission to the WESC acknowledged there was a problem in women’s sport, but meekly claimed they felt their hands were tied and could the Gorvernment possibly issue some guidance so they could point to the Govt when they start getting flack

Kit19

Surely they would not be able to ignore the evidence of the past three most recent works that effectively draw the same conclusions. And show that now more long term studies need to be released because obviously, both the military study and these studies indicate advantage maybe be much longer lasting. And frankly, i would then start to be suspicious if the studies failed to account for the natural progression of age on the female control group. When you have older males entering female sport when women would not be able to successfully compete at that age, it is obvious that needs to be accounted for with a longer study.

Sport England commissioned Gendered Intelligence to do the work & I’m assuming it’s not going to be made available to the public

GI have been very busy bees on the sport front...

genderedintelligence.co.uk/sport

I haven't read this new study, but the runner's study methodology issues were not as egregious as people assume. The results were still largely invalid due to other issues Harper had glossed over, but at least the obvious issue regarding the age difference was addressed in a defensible way. I just found it shocking that a paper with such a tiny sample size (seven subjects plus the author), and without any type of control was used to justify such an enormous change in policy affecting athletes worldwide. One study. By someone who could not even charitably be described as objective or unbiased on the issue to be proven by this paper. Without ever consulting anyone else.

I've always thought that's why "No decisions about us without us" is such an important principle. Of course that's not a guarantee, as you can see from Scotland where the government refuses to consult anything other than government-funded women's organisations (even when one such organisation repeatedly says loud and clear they do not consult their members nor claim to represent women). But the IOC didn't even manage a token nod to women before deciding who could compete as a woman.

But the IOC didn't even manage a token nod to women before deciding who could compete as a woman.

Given that some senior members think " women talk too much" why on earth would they think to actually ask female athletes for their opinions. Women know your pkace

Why is anybody even bothering with such studies?
No amount of wrong sex hormone is going to shrink men’s wider shoulder girdle, alter their centre of gravity, broaden their pelvic girdle, shrink their heart and lungs, reduce their cardiac output, etc etc.
These things are structural and unalterable.
And they are the reason why male bodies do not belong in women’s sport, however they identify. Sports are segregated by necessity.
I would advise all female athletes and sportswomen to simply walk off the track or pitch and refuse to compete in an unfair contest against male bodies. The loss of advertising revenue and the adverse publicity would quickly force a change of policy by sports’ governing bodies.

Why is anybody even bothering with such studies?

Because nowadays the world seems to demand scientific proof of all the things that we can see with our eyes because there’s plenty of people out there saying the opposite. The Caster Semenya case has shown in sport, even though organisations can win the argument in principle, courts demand proof before making judgement.

I agree, it’s a completely ridiculous situation, yet here we are, fighting to keep the opposite sex out of women’s sports because some people are more than happy to subvert the truth in positions of power.

It is definitely bonkers that we are having to show actual scientific evidence that male bodies and female bodies are different, given that that’s the foundational reason that we have women’s specific sports at all in the first place.

It’s also frustrating because don’t forget, we are pushing back on a lobby that at its heart fundamentally rejects scientific rigour as some sort of colonialist enterprise that can and should be rejected in favour of lived experience, personal testimony and anecdotal evidence.

But we have to play the game. Chipping away, one study, one ridiculous photo opportunity, and sadly, one injured woman at a time.

The angle I like to take is that there should be no fundamental presumption that fairness is best served by including trans athletes. Until we have the science available that women are not being treated unfairly, the presumption could equally be that trans athletes are excluded, and by utilitarian ends, more fairness is delivered that way.

Anyway, have bookmarked that study for my next bout of letter writing, thanks winesalot

The angle I like to take is that there should be no fundamental presumption that fairness is best served by including trans athletes. Until we have the science available that women are not being treated unfairly, the presumption could equally be that trans athletes are excluded, and by utilitarian ends, more fairness is delivered that way.

Yes. The benefit of being inclusive means that for a period of time, women again are harmed. Like knowing their is a country doping their sportspeople but not being able to prove it in the days as Sharron Davies discusses. For that period, women suffered until the drug could be tested for.

I think any of us with a connection with sport should ask the governing bodies to take into account this research in their policy making. I will be following up on some emails I sent a while back with this study.

I've written to some sports bodies before with this kind of evidence, back when this paper by Wiik et al pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31794605/ came out in March 2020 and as far as I can tell they don't care. The evidence is there and is building up, and World Rugby have done us a massive favour by reviewing it all properly and coming to the conclusions they did (and publishing it all). I know it's both sad and ridiculous that we're having to have this conversation about male and female sports being about male and female bodies and not about apparently indefinable and untestable feelings, but the sports bodies are increasingly being backed into a corner here. They either need to accept the evidence and make female sports categories strictly female sex only or admit they don't care about fairness (and in some cases safety) in female sports.

Having said the sports bodies don't appear to care, I still write because what else can I do, and the more people writng and citing the evidence, the more pressure there is on them.

(I'm also loving the idea that the author of a scientific paper might flounce if somebody disgreed with something in it. It won't work in a PhD viva!)