WHO publishes 'controversial gender guidance'

[IcakethereforeIam]

Eliza Mondegreen in Unherd sounding the alarm, all the alarms.

https://unherd.com/thepost/who-quietly-publishes-controversial-gender-guidance/

There's a consultation period that closes on 8th January, I think.

^ oops that was supposed to be in reply to @IwantToRetire 😊

I think this has been posted before but this is the only statement re Gender Affirming from WHO and as the link shows leads onto the statement about who will write the guidelines that started this thread.
https://www.who.int/news/item/28-06-2023-who-announces-the-development-of-the-guideline-on-the-health-of-trans-and-gender-diverse-people

But still provides no link as to how they reached this position back in June 2023 ie the five guidelines.

The recent statement referred to "Departments" at WHO but if you search WHO for "Departments" none come up.

So somehow these 5 guidelines imerged from ????????????? in June 2023?

The WHO have supported gender affirming care for a number of years. This is not new and has not been hidden- eg the revised ICD-11: https://www.who.int/standards/classifications/frequently-asked-questions/gender-incongruence-and-transgender-health-in-the-icd

ICD-11 has redefined gender identity-related health, replacing outdated diagnostic categories like ICD-10’s “transsexualism” and “gender identity disorder of children” with “gender incongruence of adolescence and adulthood” and “gender incongruence of childhood”, respectively. Gender incongruence has been moved out of the “Mental and behavioural disorders” chapter and into the new “Conditions related to sexual health” chapter.

Recognition in the ICD also acknowledges the links between gender identity, sexual behaviour, exposure to violence and sexually transmitted infections.

There's a link between gender identity, sexual behaviour, exposure to violence and sexually transmitted infections in children?

Treating gender incongruence in a mental health chapter was causing additional stigma for an already stigmatized condition. WHO officials added the hope that adding this condition to a sexual health chapter of the ICD codes would "help increase access to care for health interventions" and "destigmatize the condition."

So while the rest of the world is trying to destigmatise mental health conditions, the WHO is putting one of these mental health conditions in another section in order to destigmatise it. And they also see nothing wrong with saying that children have a sexual health condition when they show a dislike of gender stereotyping.

evidence suggests that transgender people often experience a disproportionately high burden of disease, including in the domains of mental, sexual and reproductive health.

But trans people being more likely to have a mental health condition is just what - a coincidence? And apparently children have a higher incidence of problems with sexual and reproductive health if they identify as trans.

Who wrote this? They sound insane.

There’s a bit of the history here:

https://www.mentalhealthjournal.org/articles/gender-incongruence-is-no-longer-a-mental-disorder.html

I cant see the date on that statement but wasn't that as result of lobbying by US Medical Insurance companies, because once "gender incongruence" ceased to be a mental disorder then those with medical insurance in the US could get surgery and / or hormones through their insurance. (That was years ago.)

Wonder which came first? Did WHO make the changes or did the insurance companies make the changes and WHO just followed suit ie didn't even consult just took the wording of what is basically medical insurance guidelines?

This article implies they made the changes back in 2018. https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/2018/06/20/transgender-not-mental-illness-world-health-organization/717758002/

I suspect that every year since then they have been lobbied by TRAs to make it closer and closer to self id, and being able to decide what procedures or drugs they want to have.

Although on re-reading the change is in fact to no longer saying homosexuality is a mental disorder, so this implies that as usual trans ideology has snuck under the misidentifications that trans is the same as being same sex attracted.

Yet another example of how a very tiny % of the population has apparently always been able to be in places of influence.

IwanttoRetire the second link I posted has some history and probably would be worth your reading. You appear to be quite new to the issue and seem to think this has happened behind people’s backs. It hasn’t and we don’t need to be spending time trying tonwork out how it happened and complaining about that. The changes to ICD-11 received extensive mainstream coverage at the time and since then, there have been constant comparisons between it and the DSM-5.

It's not the insurance companies who are lobbying for this. As I'm sure you know, insurance companies usually try to minimise their payouts, not find ways to increase them.

Transactivists, along with other interested parties who stand to make a financial gain from this, like pharmaceutical companies and some surgeons, are the ones lobbying for this to be included in insurance.

This is an article by one of the people responsible for the changes in the ICD-11.

https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/885141

The comments (by medical professionals) are interesting.

For example:
Psychiatrists meeting together to decide how to change a diagnosis for the sake of "reducing the stigma" is laughable. What about reducing the stigma of ALL mental illnesses?

The biggest error in thinking I see is my experience that transgender individuals have many other problems (ASD, psychosis, ADHD, PTSD, generalized identity diffusion, etc.) and that marketing surgery and hormones for this complex, comorbidly mentally disordered group is NOT generally in their interest

...the change in diagnostic terms has nothing to do with lessening stigma.As the author points out, it has to do with reimbursement. For some time now, insurance companies have been basing payments on diagnosis.

It was discussed on this thread in 2018.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womensrights/3331270-if-being-transgender-is-not-an-illness

Just to say I am more than aware of the issue dating back some decades.

But the US insurance companies did lobby to get gender disphoria taken off the list of mental disorders because they were lobbied by trans activists who wanted to access medical resources. It is and was a mutual circle - and as endlessly posted on here, probably with pressure from big pharma. ie the insurers can just put up their premiums and pharma companies reap the reward.

Also as I pointed out in my post, I searched the WHO web site and going back years there is no evidence they ever did a public consultation re self identity, use of hormones. It was just an announcement a couple of years after the change to the US medical listings.

If you can find a link on the WHO website itself that shows they engaged with the public prior to their announcement in 2018 I would be interested to see it.

Otherwise as I said, WHO, as the global organisation setting medical standards, seems to have decided on their own internal discussions, to promote this position.

So I am specifically talking about WHO (as this is the topic of this thread) and how they reach decisions.

So the latest statement asking for people to write guidelines isn't the issue.

It is the fact that they, apparently back in 2018, decided the medical procedures they say are appropriate for trans identifying people.

But the US insurance companies did lobby to get gender disphoria taken off the list of mental disorders
**
Really? Can you post a link?

I’d ditto OldCrone’s question. Generally speaking, insurance companies in the US historically resisted providing “gender affirming care”. I’d be interested to know which ones lobbied the WHO to change the ICD.

It was just an announcement a couple of years after the change to the US medical listings

What are you talking about here? ICD-11 isn’t a “US medical listing.” Are you mixing it up with the DSM? The potential changes to ICD-11 were discussed and publicised well before 2018 and went through a lengthy process. At the time, the main challenge to the changes was the fact that gender incongruence was being included in the ICD at all- continued inclusion was viewed as only a partial depatholization. The decision was made to include it so individuals in countries with medical insurance would not find barriers to coverage if it were removed.

ICD-11 was the WHO pushing the patient led affirmative medical pathway via removing psychological gatekeeping. Google Geoffrey Reed if you want the background.

Right now the issue is not how we got here but how/whether the WHO can be influenced/persuaded to rethink the balance on the panel and approach to developing their guidelines.

Reem Alsalem UN Special Rapporteur VAWG has written a letter

https://twitter.com/UNSRVAW/status/1744393560592351442?t=LxjOkOqmBxczcIjbOSqz_g&s=19

Excellent letter.

I'd like to mention just how fucking stupid and counterproductive and harmful it is to have mental health conditions excluded from medical insurance. Solidarity doesn't look like getting condition X redefined as not mental health, but as getting all mental illnesses onto insurance coverage.

For a bunch of people who harp on about intersectionality, TRAs sure suck at it.

You just feel so grateful that one lone voice of reasoned and measured response is being raised in the howling wilderness where the words woman, female and mother are under threat of disappearance or becoming meaningless. Whether she can accomplish anything is a different matter.

Yes. At least they won't be able to claim nobody at all raised concerns.

Reem Alsalem’s letter is covered in the Guardian today- thankfully by Amelia Gentleman

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/jan/09/un-envoy-criticises-one-sided-who-approach-trans-health-guidelines

Amelia Gentleman in the Guardian writes well on this subject.

Florence Ashley is no longer on the panel and the deadline for comments has been extended by the WHO

https://x.com/jamiewhistle/status/1747077903076978822?s=61&t=8CxL28ZCFDq66yuIWhY6_Q

Well, that's thin gruel but it's something, perhaps a start?

At least the hope of sliding it in unnoticed has been scuttled.

The WHO have also produced a FAQ which includes a statement that the evidence base for an affirmative approach for children and adolescents is “limited and variable” (ie why they are not including children and adolescents in their scope)

https://cdn.who.int/media/docs/default-source/hq-hiv-hepatitis-and-stis-library/tgd_faq_16012024.pdf?sfvrsn=79eaf57f_1

Just coming to post this update rogdmum This is good news.

However, it does show that by now even the WHO has to admit that they did not do due diligence on there guidance and have allowed a group to have significant influence on their policy. And that they have indulged in allowing an ideologically driven group to shape the world's health policies.

Where does Cass go after this?