Tavistock scandal ‘on a par with East German doping of athletes’ - top of Times home page tonight

[Fenlandia]

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/e04f4958-aa26-11ed-8a03-b2faadede0c5?shareToken=81bddfc85342137edc81797069ccd8cb

I'm so angry.

Medical professionals, nurses and doctors are meant to advocate for children, not experiment on them.

They are meant to use evidence based practice, carefully considering the best interest of children long term.

They should not be swayed by popular ideas, individuals or cash concerns.

The people making money from this - pharmaceutical companies, private cosmetic surgeons transactivist charities- they won't be paying the bill when the lawyers come - it will be all of us, as they will sue the NHS.

What a coup for Hadley, I'm so glad she went to The Times

Urgent investigations into Polly Carmichael badly needed by the looks of things. All on her watch.

I believe the source of this medical scandal (which it is, worldwide) is that because debate was not allowed, the kinds of analyses which are routinely applied in medicine otherwise (what side effects might appear, short-term or long-term, what studies of efficacy have been consulted etc.) simply could not be done as those who did propose them were swamped by such fury that their lives and careers were made much more difficult.

One could argue that the individuals concerned about these problems should have raised their heads above parapets in larger numbers and earlier, but the rewards form doing that were negligible earlier and the punishments rather extreme. That's why the early whistle-blowers deserve so much praise.

But this does not let the organisations themselves off the hook. They should have insisted on proper evaluations.

Even more generally the erasure of women's words, spaces, awards, sports and so on has been allowed to happen because debate has been ruled out as bigotry before it even began, and because almost all the legal changes were carried out behind the curtain without any consultation of other stake-holders, especially women and girls.

the kinds of analyses which are routinely applied in medicine otherwise (what side effects might appear, short-term or long-term, what studies of efficacy have been consulted etc.) simply could not be done

But how can this be stood over by anyone?

How can anyone justify abandoning usual protocols here? How did this get by nhs rules and regs?

This is the bit I don't understand.

Another nugget to chew on:

When gay clinicians such as Bristow voiced their concerns to those in charge, they say it was implied that they were not objective because they were gay and therefore “too close” to the work. (Gids does not accept this claim.)

Am I right in thinking that some practitioners at GIDS were trans? Was there no equivalent concern that they might not be objective?

I've said it before on here but I think there is also a scandal to be uncovered in relation to adult services.

I am personally aware of a case where an extremely vulnerable and mentally unwell female was given no capacity assessment when accessing gender reassignment services and I saw a letter from the Hammersmith clinic which said capacity was presumed, even though we told them we had grave concerns about general capacity (relating to something else, which is why we contacted them, as we wrongly assumed they'd have a psychiatrist who could give us a capacity assessment).

Given the known link between neuro divesity, mental health issues, childhood trauma I found it extraordinary that capacity and/or other therapy wasn't explored.

In my case the female had paranoid psychosis and the clinic presumed capacity. She was also gay but terrified of being labled a homosexual. They might have discovered that of they'd treated the whole person and joined the dots. Maybe they did after we wrote to them but I doubt it.

I am equally puzzled about this.

Though I should clarify that it looks to me like some sources may have been were consulted, but all of them seem to have been picked from the side insisting on affirmation only.

Yet the lack of evidence on the longer-term consequences of puberty blockers didn't seem to matter at all. And yes, that is horrible and something I don't understand at all, unless the argument that withdrawing access to them would instantly cause suicides.

But Tavistock knew the actual suicide figures for their patient group (including those on the waiting list), and so they must have known that the actual figures did not support the 41% of whatever the activist-quoted figure might be.

They just said, ‘We couldn’t get it past our junior members of staff.’

What the actual fuck?

I think there were two issues going on here.

People look back at the fights that were had for sex equality, race equality and gay equality. We were astounded by the refusal of those who could grant equality to do so, when it would cost them nothing. So when a new fight came along - gender/trans rights - lots of people (me included, at the time) fell over themselves to show that Things Had Changed. An oppressed minority needed rights and protections? Sure, come on in, have some special treatment.

Then it started to snowball, no doubt pushed along by the likes of Mermaids and Stonewall who - in my opinion - had a vested interest in all this, as did others with far more nefarious intentions. But by the time the "Hang on a minute" thoughts started to surface, we were too far down the rabbit hole of anything other than complete affirmation being transphobia. So people were silenced for fear of their jobs.

Secondly, I suspect many clinicians that were caught up in the rush of it all and who genuinely thought they were at the forefront of new medicines and treatments to treat distressed children. Of course, whether that comes about out of self-aggrandisement and greed (all those conferences in far-flung places, not to mention the prestige of being seen as an expert in their field) or of misplaced well-meaning where they were talked out of doubts, remains to be seen.

HereForTheFreeLunch · Today 19:46

That's exactly what caught my eye, too.

And how dare they allow Susie Green to dictate which doctors would see the children? How fucking dare they and she.

One could argue that the individuals concerned about these problems should have raised their heads above parapets in larger numbers and earlier, but the rewards form doing that were negligible earlier and the punishments rather extreme. That's why the early whistle-blowers deserve so much praise

The numbers of children involved is staggering but could easily have been so much higher had it not been for the amazingly brave Stephanie Aria Davis.

Fucking hell:
On other occasions a change in clinician would be requested by Green, the Mermaids chief, Spiliadis said.

And
Interestingly, there were no negative responses to the proposal. They just said, ‘We couldn’t get it past our junior members of staff.’

A common theme of activism infecting and diverting rational thought, processes, safeguarding and science.

Sorry about typo Stephanie Davies-Arai

I meant to add that I also suspect clinical protocols were ignored because a) it was seen that the ends justified the means and b) this was seen as a 'special' area of medicine for which the norms just shouldn't apply.

And of course there would probably have been those who just didn't WANT them to apply, so ignored them. They got away with it because GIDS was the golden goose. I think you can draw a parallel between this level of experimentation on kids (and it does seem to be experimentation to me, after all they had - and still have - no idea what the long term effects of these drugs will be) and things like the Stanford Prison Experiment and the Milgram Experiment. They were off the fucking charts in terms of their ethics, but the harm done was seen as justified for the results they gave.

How can anyone justify abandoning usual protocols here? How did this get by nhs rules and regs?

I’ve wondered about this with GIDS being within the NHS. I naively assumed, for a long time, that if this was part of the NHS it must be practising medicine that was fairly well established and based on decent evidence.

The answer seems to be that in areas of medicine which are fast moving, sometimes there is acceptance that the supposed experts in the field can use their clinical expertise in lieu of gold-plated evidence. It was also mooted that proper trials with control groups would be too cruel to patients early on, then later, presumably became impossible as parents whose children ended up with the treatment they didn’t want simply went elsewhere. This is the problem when medical decisions are not made on merit or success rates, but instead are patient (or parent) driven.

There doesn’t seem to have been due diligence with regard to WPATH, who represent themselves as medical experts, but have, as one of their past presidents, Stephen Whittle, who has no medical background and seems to be principally a very successfully lobbyist. There are also multiple medics involved who have transitioned themselves, who obviously cannot have an objective view.

I think the massive rise has also been precipitated by the US medical system, which seems to be more driven by greed than excellence. Turning distressed mental health patients (limited income to therapists) into consumers (puberty blockers, life-long hormone use, multiple surgeries etc).

GIDS was long complained about because it was slower than others to adopt the affirmation and drugs pathway. Presumably, Polly Carmichael’s predecessor had at least some scruples.

But other well-established physicians who favoured watchful waiting were pushed out of their jobs at the hands of lobbyists. Any medic sticking it out, despite all the pressure from parents and Mermaids, would probably find themselves at risk of being removed as well and probably pre-empted it by leaving. It really does seem that it might have been a perfect storm situation.

The clinic accounted for almost 30 per cent of the Tavistock NHS Trust’s income by 2021 and staff said it resembled a “tech start-up” with regular trips to international conferences
**
Repeating this paragraph for emphasis. It's the most important fact going on.

Yes Red, keep repeating it. It's still happening.

And spread to schools and academic institutions/ charities who train teachers some time ago too.

They simultaneously worked on getting trans into social consciousness on a par with being gay. Pulled the wool and every sparkly drag queen fabric possibly over their eyes.

Though why no one twigged that being gay needs no medication and so there's no comparison I've no idea.

Am I right in thinking that some practitioners at GIDS were trans? Was there no equivalent concern that they might not be objective?

That's where they've co-opted other forms of civil rights; "minority groups speaking for minority groups" and their voices being magnified. It stopped being a medical condition and was their whole self, their identity.

There are areas that work outside nice guidelines.

I know my local trust has been doing so around utis in children for well over 10 years. Based on evidence, not sure where from, but the Tavi could have been using the flimsy work done elsewhere.

Children as young as three 😡

It really angers me that children with complex SEN needs are not being safeguarded.

I recently attended a NHS training. It was like trans bingo. It had the lot. Starting with the "transgender baby". "Hormone washing" in utero. "Male brain in a female body". Recommendation of Mermaids (who are sadly under attack from anti trans forces).
The only good thing was that advice to diversify our social media feed recommended following Jeffrey Marsh and Katy Montgomerie - From the comments I would say others on the session were extremely ignorant of the whole thing - if they dabble their toes in JM and KM I should think their brains will well and truly fall out!

Non binary explained!!!

Polly Carmichael needs to be in jail.