BMA to vote to 'disavow' the Cass review

[mzdemeanour]

The governing body of the BMA is to hold a vote tomorrow (Wednesday July 17) to 'disavow' the Cass Review. Words fail me to be honest. Any doctors, particularly members of the BMA, able to explain or comment?

Article by Hannah Barnes in the Spectator www.newstatesman.com/politics/health/2024/07/why-are-british-doctors-voting-to-reject-the-cass-report and thread on X/Twitter x.com/hannahsbee/status/1813252387504857241

Please pardon my language but what the actual fuck is happening with the BMA?!

This unusually ideological behaviour by members of the BMA will give American critics of Cass, and UK critics like Maugham, Webberley, and Green, more grist (and grift) for their mill.

Just because its members are doctors doesn't mean it isn't a bog standard union with leftist i.e. in this case captured views. Contrary to the beliefs of some, doctors are not gods and intellectual giants. They have the same idiotic predjudices we all have. If the science doesn't fit their views they junk the science, not their views. They're just captured - that's it.

@Madcats doctors pay for their own indemnity cover

@AnnaMagnani thanks!

I left the BMA in 2006 when the government messed up our training. I nearly rejoined a few months ago when the new GP contract was being discussed but didn't. I don't think any of my medic friends are still members and I don't know any medics who are not GC. If this gets put out to all members I may have to rejoin to oppose it.

I was wondering what percentage of BMA members actually voted for the counsel members. The most recent elections show a 9.7% and 6.2% turnout rate. With those low voting rates it's easy for zealots to take control of the council

Extraordinary. It really does seem to be the case that a bunch of millennial Citizen Smiths have taken over the BMC, the teaching unions and the therapist membership bodies. Good oh.

Do they imagine they will survive this radical onslaught? Truth will always out.

It is disappointing to see organisations fold to threats & feel forced to platform advocates of conversion practice

Out of interest, does anyone know what she was implying was the advocated ‘conversion practice’?

Definitely the UCU is wholly captured and it’s beyond me how Grady got re-elected other than low turnout. Whilst you’d hope that medical doctors would retain a semblance of understanding about anatomy and physiology a short pubmed search of trans health articles highlights an abundance of insanity. No big surprise that Emma is interested in mental health.

Alas truth can take a long time to out.

I see Emma Runswick (BMA organiser) is a junior doctor in psychiatry. I wish that she would read the Cass report and spend time considering it! Quite apart from its intrinsic value, it is extremely helpful in showing how to evaluate evidence in any area of medicine.

By reading the Cass report Dr. Runswick could:

1. Learn how to evaluate clinical research,
2. Improve her prospects in terms of post graduate exams and higher specialist training, and
3. Most importantly, remove her Twitter/X posts on the Cass report. They are simply wrong.

That's terrible 😢

@ValerieDoonican

I was a lot more certain of the "correct line" on stuff when I was in my activist 30s than I ever can be now - including about my GC beliefs of course!

So true. And why it's so funny when the TRAs and TRA-adjacent come out with their guff about GC just being the voice of bigotted old people who are going to die out soon anyway leaving the enlightened youth to enjoy their rainbow-hued utopia. Because while they have never been us, we have been them and we know how much they still have to learn.

(And yes, I also put as much, if not more, effort into challenging my own GC position as I do into challenging the genderist one, although to be fair that's probably at least partly because the GC position has so far held up while the genderist "position" really does not hang together once you start to look at it critically.)

@FlirtsWithRhinos - yes indeed !

Fingers crossed that this will finally crack the glue and allow serious conversation about trans healthcare to resume without every other comment becoming an endless spiral of accusations that one or more participants did not read the Cass Review.

Someone on TwiX commenting on Streeting's thread about the PB ban talked about how dogmatic and bull-headed they had been in their youthful activism, how they can still be proud about what they were involved with even though glad they've matured (I think they said Sec 28 and Poll Tax?).
It got me thinking about the social impact of all this which I've never considered before, what will happen for all those idealistic, right-on activists who really do believe they've been on the right side of history? Even young people who don't get very involved, just generally have an idea of what the "right" thing to think is. What will the effect on them be when e.g. big lawsuits happen for people who were given PBs or x-sex hormones as children?
I wonder if it won't make for a more conservative generation, or perhaps more cynical, embittered?

Absolutely! We are used to holding doctors up as beacons of integrity and professionalism, but in recent years a lot of the shine has come off, and from some nurses too. Not all doctors and nurses are equal; some are not really suited to their job; some are neglectful of their duties; some are downright hostile to patients; others do not maintain an approprioate level of professionalism.

I once had an appointment to see a consultant dermatologist, over a mosquito bite that had that had not fully healed ( I was bitten when in Rome on holiday). I knew that was what the issue was but didn't understand why this had happened and was it an issue. I overheard the consultant telling her junior ( both actually very young) that " You don't get mosquitos in Rome". I couldn't quite believe it!

Just having a high status- level job or profession and/or earning a good living does not make someone automatically widely engaged, critically reflective or independent of mind. People can perform all kinds of roles and occupations, and do so through the type of learning that comes from job specific repetitive behaviours and routines - but that type of intelligence is not necessarily transferred to any other area of their life.

When you talk about 'trans healthcare' what you are really talking about is confused and distressed young people who have been brought up with ( and encouraged into by responsible adults) the concept that it is possible to be born in the wrong body -and have been led to believe that taking chemical substances, not naturally suited to that body, will somehow rectify that.

This is scandalous - especially in the light of recent revelations about people, even children and babies, having been subject to medical experiments without their or their parents consent and knowledege, leading to future ill health and even death.

The appropriate healthcare for mental and emotional issues is mental and emotional talking therapies.

This sits within a wider context of different advocacy groups stating that the only valid expertise is that coming from 'experts through experience'.

Medicine is based on scientific principles and whilst service users are consulted, they do not determine treatment.

Cass argues for these principles to be upheld across all areas of medicine, including gender medicine. The messaging from the BMA is unclear. They seem to be conflating issues between the power service users should have and the validity of Cass's review.

posted by someone on a thread by DNK. Stonewall link again.

This is so true.

According to her profile, her skills are:

– Experience of development of open and evidence-based policy in health or health-related issues
– Ability to present policy reports (in writing and orally) to a variety of internal and external audiences
– Ability to influence highly articulate and challenging individuals, using expertise, tact and diplomacy
– Ability to form and maintain strategic relationships with counterparts in stakeholder organisations
– Personal resilience - needs to ‘own’ policy reports/proposals and withstand challenges from elected members and external stakeholders

It isn’t even young people we are talking about. You can’t block puberty unless you are treating a child.

Also:

-Ability to challenge and respond constructively to policy proposals produced by government, NHS England or other stakeholders, based on analysis of evidence, options considered, risk and benefits of proposals.

( Laura Russell) Her role is primarily a policy making one.

So I assume Dr Emma & Laura combined have been banging on and on and well here we are!

GI has to be one of the most successful campaigns ever run. The previous great work of Stonewall meant that they were firmly embedded and ready to mobilise in every organisation with any power. I remember in the late 90s/early 00s looking for work, and being reassured if the org carried a Stonewall logo. I guess it happens when organisations seemingly become above reproach.