Helen Webberley

[Signalbox]

Looks like Helem Webberley's substantive case has finally been listed for 26th July 2021

www.mpts-uk.org/hearings-and-decisions/medical-practitioners-tribunals/dr-helen-webberley-jul-21

@Nefelibata33

Puberty blockers aren't damaging. They just prevent the onset of puberty, it just gives someone who's trans time before the onset of something that they really don't want to happen.

I don't think adults who aren't trans have the right to tell kids who are trans what they can or can't do.

I despair really. It's not about protecting children ultimately. That's just an excuse for a load of unnecessary hatred. In reality, it's just that lots of people don't like trans people. I wish people would come out and say it, just be honest. It's irrational hatred

The statement that Triptorelin, which is the most commonly used GnRH agonist for prevention of puberty “isn’t harmful” is categorically not true. I’ve been on it myself, and it was among the most difficult six months of my life, with absolutely intolerable side effects, some of which were irreversible. I would never give this medication to a child, and the more distressed and unhappy they were, the less likely I would be to think that this clumsy, damaging drug could be the answer to what ailed them.

You’re also wrong in repeating the line that all they do is give “time to think”. In the research from the Tavistock that came to light following the Bell decision, their own figures demonstrated that all but one child given puberty blockers progressed seamlessly onto cross sex hormones, so far from opening up options, Triptorelin actually cemented the trans identity into adulthood. This raises the very strong possibility that the children being given puberty blockers have actually been denied the possibility of growing into acceptance of their bodies, which puberty actually provides. Would you like the links? Would you read them?

Having cleared that up, we can get back to the point of the thread which is even if the treatment itself was evidenced and uncontroversial, there are very serious doubts about Webberley’s fitness to practice. I’m curious about why you think that doesn’t matter?

Based upon a few rare cases where trans children have made the wrong decision

because of a few kids who made mistakes, all the genuine trans kids will suffer

Honestly I can never understand why people blame the children. Why is it not the fault of the adults who suggested to a gnc child that they might have been born in the wrong body? Why is it not the fault of the clinician who diagnosed the gender dysphoria and prescribed the medication? If a clinician wrongly diagnosed a person with cancer which lead to invasive life changing treatment, would you blame the patient when it turns out the diagnosis was wrong?

Plus they don’t collect statistics on children who desist so it’s anyone’s guess how many children “make the wrong decision”.

Puberty is not something that should be turned off unless there is a diagnosis of precocious puberty, in which case puberty is merely delayed.
Whoever first came up with this idea of using puberty blockers to treat gender dysphoria needs holding to account. This treatment is causing Irreversible damage to young minds & bodies.

*don’t collect data

trans children

What's a trans child?

Given that 80% or higher of children referred to the tavistock later decided they were actually gay, how on earth do you define a "trans child?"

Given that adults transition and then, after finding it does nothing for their mental health and dysphoria, and indeed worsens it along with their physical health, detransition? And this happens in countries where trans is well accepted in society.

How do you define a "trans child" given that a history of sexual abuse and other traumas or mental health difficulties are common among trans people?

How do you define a "trans child" when gender stereotypes in society are so incredibly rigid and young boys can't wear dresses, pink and glitter without "coming out as trans?" It's just clothes ffs.

Why earmark a physically healthy child for life long medical care when it's society that's the issue?

Why do so when many adults live with gender dysphoria without any medication? (Laura Black, Erin Brewer have written about this)

💵 is one factor.

There are a number of others.

Also, weird dichotomy of trans adults claiming to be trans with little to no physical alterations (mainly males) bar extra oestrogen and dosing up of youngsters with all the meds and planned surgeries.

One rule for the adults; another for the kids huh? 🤔

And the non binaries aren't exempt. Breast binding and mastectomies for the girls, just a bit of lippy and heels for the boys.

Nefelibata33 puberty blockers cause infertility.

As many of the children presenting at gender clinics are also autistic this means the gender clinics are removing people who are a "bit different" from the gene pool.

Do you know what the noun for that is?

There is a huge discrepancy between the surgery that most adults who identify as trans have actually had and the expectations of children (and their parents) who have been led to believe that they can grow up to be their desired sex.

Whoever first came up with this idea of using puberty blockers to treat gender dysphoria needs holding to account. This treatment is causing Irreversible damage to young minds & bodies.

'The Tavistock’s Experiment with Puberty Blockers'
Michael Biggs
Department of Sociology and St Cross College, University of Oxford
(version 1.0.1, 29 July 2019)

(extract)
In 1994 a 16-year-old girl who wished to be a boy, known to us as B, entered the Amsterdam Gender Clinic. She was unique for having her sexual development halted at the age of 13, after an adventurous paediatric endocrinologist gave her a Gonadotropin-Releasing Hormone agonist (GnRHa). Originally developed to treat prostate cancer, these drugs are also used to delay puberty when it develops abnormally early: in girls younger than 8, and boys younger than 9. The endocrinologist’s innovation was to use the drug to stop normal puberty altogether, in order to prevent the development of unwanted secondary sexual characteristics—with the aim of administering cross-sex hormones in later adolescence.
Dutch clinicians used B’s case to create a new protocol for transgendering children, which enabled physical intervention at an age far below the normal age of consent (Cohen-Kettenis and Goozen 1998) continues

The Dutch protocol became well known in Britain before the first scientific article was published. A television documentary showed girls who wished to be boys travelling to meet their peers in the Netherlands, who were taking GnRHa as young as 13 (Channel 4 1996). This inspired Stephen Whittle —who led the transgender campaigning organization Press for Change —to argue for a legal right to access “pubertal suppression”; doctors who failed to provide drugs could be vulnerable to litigation (Downs and Whittle 2000; Wren 2000: 224).
This argument was first advanced at a conference at Oxford in 1998, whose keynote speaker was the head of the Amsterdam Gender Clinic. There was little movement, however, over the next few years. Guidelines issued by the British Society for Paediatric Endocrinology and Diabetes (BSPED) in 2005 still insisted that children had to reach full sexual development (known as Tanner Stage 5)—around the age of 15—before being prescribed GnRHa drugs.

A crucial role was played by organizations that campaign for the transgendering of children: the Gender Identity Research and Education Society (GIRES) and Mermaids.

GIRES organized a symposium in London in 2005 to develop “guidelines for endocrinological intervention”. Additional funding came from Mermaids , two medical charities—Nuffield Foundation and King’s Fund —and the Servite Sisters Charitable Trust Fund. This brought together the creators of the Dutch protocol, American clinicians like Norman Spack in Boston, and key British figures such as Domenico Di Ceglie , the Director of GIDS, and Polly Carmichael and Russell Viner , both at Great Ormond Street Hospital. (The latter two would lead the 2011 experiment.) Some of the participants vigorously lobbied for the Dutch protocol. Veronica Sharp from Mermaids “described users’ and parents’ views of the available treatments, and the anguish they may experience when hormone blocking isdelayed” (GIRES 2005). The symposium ended with agreement to push for amendments to guidance from bodies like BSPED, and to conduct collaborative research between London,
Amsterdam, and Boston. There was another meeting in Amsterdam in the following year, but the collaboration did not eventuate.

International developments did enable parents to circumvent the NHS. GIRES (2006) warned that “those who can in any way afford to do so have to consider taking their children to the USA”. The first was Susie Green , who later became the chief executive of Mermaids.
In 2007 she took her son Jackie, aged 12, to Boston, to purchase a prescription for GnRHa from Spack ; the drug was supplied by an online Canadian pharmacy (Sun, 19 October 2011).

A presentation at Mermaids , presumably by Green, instructed parents in this medical tourism (Mermaids 2007). Spack treated a further seven British children over the next few years (Times, 22 January 2012).

By 2008, GIRES was more strident in criticizing British clinicians. One of its founders, Terry Reed , denounced them as “transphobic”:
^They are hoping that during puberty the natural hormones themselves will act on the brain to ‘cure’ these trans teenagers. What we do know is what happens if you don’t offer hormone blockers. You are stuck with unwanted secondary sex characteristics in the long term and in the short term these teenagers end up suicidal.(Guardian, 14 August 2008) continues
users.ox.ac.uk/~sfos0060/Biggs_ExperimentPubertyBlockers.pdf

@Sophoclesthefox

I don’t think it can be said too many times, merry. If you artificially close the door on puberty, then that’s it - the child will never physically mature into an adult body. you can hammer a male body as much as you like with oestrogen, it will never go through a female puberty, because being as as a female puberty is one that produces an adult, sexually mature female body, a male body cannot do that.

I don’t understand why allies aren’t shocked about that.

THIS!!! This needs to be repeated over and over - this bullshit about puberty blockers being a 'pause' to allow kids to go through 'the right puberty' is such bullshit. The only puberty you can go through is the one that occurs in your sexes body. A 'cross sex puberty' is not puberty, its just giving cross sex hormones to a perpetually prepubescent body!

I remember when Nikki Grahame died recently, reading about her life. She suffered horrifically with osteoporosis and said her bones were 'literally crumbling'. The reason for this was that, due to her anorexia, she never went through puberty properly. And yet here we are, talking about how kids not going through puberty 'isn't harmful' and how they should be given highly powerful, dangerous, off label drugs in order to stop their puberty. Its sick.

Puberty isn't something you can 'choose'. Puberty isn't just for kids who want boobs or a low voice, and if you don't want those things you can just 'opt out'. It is a vital part of human development for the entire body and if you don't go through it for whatever reason it can have horrendous consequences.

I just can't believe people still defend this!

@Nefelibata33

Puberty blockers aren't damaging. They just prevent the onset of puberty, it just gives someone who's trans time before the onset of something that they really don't want to happen.

I don't think adults who aren't trans have the right to tell kids who are trans what they can or can't do.

I despair really. It's not about protecting children ultimately. That's just an excuse for a load of unnecessary hatred. In reality, it's just that lots of people don't like trans people. I wish people would come out and say it, just be honest. It's irrational hatred

You should be ashamed of yourself parroting this utter horseshit.

I'm embarrassed for you.

*She says Andrew's surgeon is now dead. But Dr Kennedy, who assessed Andrew's mental fitness, admitted to The Sunday Age: "I don't know if he was ready for it (surgery) or not. He said he was ready for it. He'd been hounding us since he was 18."

It's true that Andrew thought he was a transsexual. However, the broken childhood that preceded his referral to the clinic is a recurring theme among those who feel they were misdiagnosed. Born to teenage parents, his earliest memories are of being hit and spat on by his father.*

From 12 years ago

www.smh.com.au/national/i-will-never-be-able-to-have-sex-again-ever-20090530-br41.html

A presentation at Mermaids , presumably by Green, instructed parents in this medical tourism (Mermaids 2007). Spack treated a further seven British children over the next few years (Times, 22 January 2012).

Dr Norman Spack (Boston USA)
TedTalk
2013
www.ted.com/talks/norman_spack_how_i_help_transgender_teens_become_who_they_want_to_be?language=en

2013 lecture in which Norman Spack explains how he treated 12 UK childen including Susie Green's child and claims credit for 'successfully' restricting Jackie's height through use of cross-sex hormones as well as puberty blocking drugs. Spack desribes that Susie Green purchased hormones for her son in Canada and criticises NHS Tavistock GIDS for not prescribing puberty blockers to all children who request them.

2005 article
(extract)
"Dr. Norman Spack, clinical director of the endocrine division at Children's Hospital in Boston, said gender identity is formed at birth and is not a product of the environment. Much more research still needs to be done around how male and female brains differ and how transgenderism occurs, he said. Of the more than 100 transgendered people he has treated, many secretly cross-dressed as children and suppressed their gender identity because their parents were punitive.

''In many cases they went on to live a life that was a sham, getting married and having children," said Spack, one of the few pediatric endocrinologists in the country who specializes in gender identity and intersex issues. ''They go through a difficult time of depression coming to grips with the fact that their body doesn't match their brain."

Most of Spack's transgender patients are adults, he said, but he is involved in the care of about five prepubescent children dealing with gender identity issues.

''It's the relatively rare child who will come forward and have the courage to say, 'This is what I am, even though it was not what I was born to look like,' " Spack said. ''I admire the school for its acceptance. When schools set an example like this, it's a lesson for all." (continues) archive.boston.com/news/local/articles/2005/03/05/methuen_school_faces_parents_queries_on_students_gender_issue/

2005 article
(extract
"IDEAS: At what age should children be allowed to take hormones, like estrogen and testosterone, that will forever change the way their bodies develop?
SPACK: Well, the Dutch would say 16. But I think more flexible guidelines will be coming out. For some kids, 16 might be appropriate. For others you lose opportunities if you wait. [One of my patients, a] transgendered girl from the UK, was destined to be a 6-foot-4 male. With treatment, she's going to end up 5-foot-10.

IDEAS: What are the most difficult ethical issues you face?
SPACK: The biggest challenge is the issue of fertility. When young people halt their puberty before their bodies have developed, and then take cross-hormones for a few years, they'll probably be infertile. You have to explain to the patients that if they go ahead, they may not be able to have children. When you're talking to a 12-year-old, that's a heavy-duty conversation. Does a kid that age really think about fertility? But if you don't start treatment, they will always have trouble fitting in. And my patients always remind me that what's most important to them is their identity.

IDEAS: Several years ago, you became an evangelist for transgender kids at Children's Hospital. How did you become so committed to this issue?
SPACK: Well, let's start with 1974: I'm working at Bridge Over Troubled Waters as a volunteer. I see lots of transgendered kids. They were runaways, in bad shape. Then years later, in 1985, I'm working in adolescent medicine. Someone sends me a transgendered Harvard graduate who presented himself as a male. He introduced me to his friends and support groups. And then I began working with transgendered people in their 20s. The people in their 20s were socially in good shape. But they were having trouble getting their physique to conform to their identity. I knew the twenty-somethings could have better chances of passing if they were treated earlier.

IDEAS: And how did you make the case for this specialized clinic at Children's Hospital?
SPACK: In the last five years, I've been getting more and more referrals, parents with gender-variant kids. The parents heard about me through Internet support groups. So, I began to bring my transgendered patients and their parents - kids as young as 9 - to a large number of clinical conferences in various departments at Children's Hospital. That way, my colleagues could learn about this population. My philosophy is, "Who am I to say what it's like to be transgendered when I have people who are living with it every day?" These kids won over the hospital, one department at a time."(continues)
archive.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2008/03/30/qa_with_norman_spack/?page=2

@Nefelibata33

Puberty blockers aren't damaging. They just prevent the onset of puberty, it just gives someone who's trans time before the onset of something that they really don't want to happen.

I don't think adults who aren't trans have the right to tell kids who are trans what they can or can't do.

I despair really. It's not about protecting children ultimately. That's just an excuse for a load of unnecessary hatred. In reality, it's just that lots of people don't like trans people. I wish people would come out and say it, just be honest. It's irrational hatred

To be clear, are you claiming that only those adults who identify as 'trans' should comment on the appropriate Safeguarding, health and social care interventions for distressed children once they are identified as 'trans'?

You have identified the primary source of the very serious Safeguarding and Child Protection failures which has impacted a generation of children.

Puberty blockers aren't damaging. They just prevent the onset of puberty, it just gives someone who's trans time before the onset of something that they really don't want to happen.

NHS website
(extract)
"Puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones
Puberty blockers (gonadotrophin-releasing hormone analogues) pause the physical changes of puberty, such as breast development or facial hair.

Little is known about the long-term side effects of hormone or puberty blockers in children with gender dysphoria.

Although GIDS advises this is a physically reversible treatment if stopped, it is not known what the psychological effects may be.

It's also not known whether hormone blockers affect the development of the teenage brain or children's bones. Side effects may also include hot flushes, fatigue and mood alterations." (continues)

www.nhs.uk/conditions/gender-dysphoria/treatment/

When young people halt their puberty before their bodies have developed, and then take cross-hormones for a few years, they'll probably be infertile. You have to explain to the patients that if they go ahead, they may not be able to have children. When you're talking to a 12-year-old, that's a heavy-duty conversation. Does a kid that age really think about fertility? But if you don't start treatment, they will always have trouble fitting in. And my patients always remind me that what's most important to them is their identity.

Is it Sweden or Denmark where there's a worrying number of young women seeking fertility support due to damage from PBs?

Drs Helen and Mike Webberley
Screenshot, "7:41 pm · 29 Jul 2021 from Manilva, España"

twitter.com/MyWebDoctorUK/status/1420816788447760384

I don't think adults who aren't trans anorexic have the right to tell kids who are trans anorexic what they can or can't do.

If it is ok for one it is ok for the other. What's the fundamental difference.

Anyway back to some of the timelines discussed, I had children 06, 08, 12, somewhere between the youngest two was this explosion in pink Vs blue. Suddenly everything seemed to be one colour or the other. It was there before but there was a very stark difference. It's probably all a bit chicken and egg though.

Screenshots of Webberley's public statements and tweets aren't evidence of true believer status - everything she says publicly is an ad campaign for credulous people like Nefelibata33 who gobble down and regurgitate the lies.

Everyone is saying they don't understand how a doctor can say the things she does, knowing the harm they do. I admire the sunny optimism of thinking that she must really believe her own ad campaigns, but the woman has trawled through the world looking to sell medication to desperate people.

Personally, her being an unscrupulous grifter who runs a game that relies on her public statements of being the only doctor out there who will help, to snag the desperate and the foolish is the only conclusion that fits and requires no qualification. She wants money. She doesn't care about infertile couples or children with dysphoria.

This true believer hucksterism is what means the dopey sods who rock up here telling us that it's all vital, lifesaving work still cling desperately to the lies. We're not helping them by pandering to this idea that she's just a deeply misguided doctor who means well. They need to see clearly that she is a complete charlatan and there is no mystery about her motivation - she wants their cash, she will present herself as their saviour to get it and she doesn't actually care at all.

Is it Sweden or Denmark where there's a worrying number of young women seeking fertility support due to damage from PBs?

Sweden published an in depth study into the extent of harms caused by drugs that block puberty in 2019:

National Review
Major Swedish Hospital Bans Puberty Blocking for Gender Dysphoria
By WESLEY J. SMITH
May 5, 2021

(extract)
"Karolinska Hospital, a major health institution in Sweden, is stopping their use. First, there is little scientific to support such interventions. From the hospital’s official statement:

In December 2019, the SBU (Swedish Agency for Health Technology Assessment and Assessment of Social Services) published an overview of the knowledge base which showed a lack of evidence for both the long-term consequences of the treatments, and the reasons for the large influx of patients in recent years.

Even more importantly, the potential for harming the patient physically is very real:

These treatments are potentially fraught with extensive and irreversible adverse consequences such as cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, infertility, increased cancer risk, and thrombosis. This makes it challenging to assess the risk/benefit for the individual patient, and even more challenging for the minors and their guardians to be in a position of an informed stance regarding these treatments. (continues)
www.nationalreview.com/corner/major-swedish-hospital-bans-puberty-blocking-for-gender-dysphoria/

Finns Turn against Puberty Blockers for Gender Dysphoria
By WESLEY J. SMITH
July 25, 2021
(extract)
"Finnish medical guidelines are now opposed to most puberty blocking and adolescent transitioning, except in the most severe cases and, then, only in a research setting.

First, note this eye-opener that most cases of youth transgenderism resolve during puberty. Moreover, puberty blocking should not be among the first interventions attempted to relieve the child’s mental anguish. From the guidelines on treating youth gender dysphoria recently (unofficially) translated into English (my emphasis):

Cross-sex identification in childhood, even in extreme cases, generally disappears during puberty. However, in some cases, it persists or even intensifies. Gender dysphoria may also emerge or intensify at the onset of puberty. There is considerable variation in the timing of the onset of puberty in both sexes. The first-line treatment for gender dysphoria is psychosocial support and, as necessary, psychotherapy and treatment of possible comorbid psychiatric disorders. (continues)

www.nationalreview.com/corner/fins-turn-against-puberty-blockers-for-gender-dysphoria/

Just place marking to catch up.

Threadreader collects The Helen Webberley Tribunal Twitter threads here:
threadreaderapp.com/user/tribunaltweets

WarriorN that's horrifying.

Those poor kids. And those bastard surgeons and psychiatrists. Failed by everyone.

I REALLY hope Baroness Nicholson's office look at this page and that the announcement on the 1st August is a public enquiry into the stuff that's gone on in the UK.

I'm sure that there will be cases parallel to those sad ones in Australia.