Hannah Barnes article: Why Wes Streeting changed his mind on cross-sex hormones

[RoyalCorgi]

I haven't seen a thread on this. Hannah Barnes has written a very good article about the evidence on the harm caused by cross-sex hormones.

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/health/2025/05/exclusive-why-wes-streeting-changed-his-mind-on-cross-sex-hormones

Archive link: https://archive.is/dRF4t

It's really worrying (though not surprising) to see just how harmful these hormones are:

"Research showed trans women (“natal males”) have a <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.is/o/dRF4t/pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6636681/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">substantially higher risk of ischemic stroke, venous thromboembolism (VTE) – which includes deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism – and heart attacks. After eight years of oestrogen use, trans women had a risk of VTE nearly 17 times higher than other biological males, and 13.7 times than biological women. Studies have also suggested that females who take testosterone, have an increased risk of heart attacks."

But according to Helen Webberley there's no problem. If you want more hair, a deeper voice & bigger, better defined muscles - take testosterone. If you want softer skin and more curves - take oestrogen. And that's all there is to it.

Isn't that right, Helen?

Helen? Are you still there?

Thank you for this. my friend’s son is 16 and about to start on hormones. I’ll have one last try with this to help his mum get him to wait …

I hope that works out well @SpringCalling, but it's possible they might go ahead quickly and by any available means if they think it's all about to become illegal.

Who could have guessed? Turns out that interfering with major bodily processes in children and young people is more unkind than saying "No" to the Be Kind ideology.

Shame nobody ever spoke up about this, what with all the years of data from girls treated with blockers for precocious puberty, and men treated with oestrogen for cancers.

Oh, wait...

So cross sex hormones are bad for you. How can this be a surprise? Do something Wes, and quickly.

When you think of the reluctance in some cases to provide same sex hormones to those that need them, in case of adverse effects (eg HRT, still a problem to access for some women), it beggars belief that this was ever thought a good idea.

Thanks OP. This just highlights the criminally irresponsible behaviour of medics in prescribing these drugs to children and young people.

it needs to stop, the NHS is creating problems for itself in the future.

I thought doctors took an oath to do no harm. I am amazed that this gender bullocks has taken root in our society so deeply

And all so a bunch of fetishistic men could validate their 'sex change'

No excuse is possible. It's unforgivable.

I hope he does act quickly. But I hope that he also bans them for adults. Because while there is obviously a strong case that teenagers are too young to make good choices for themselves, surely there is a general principle that we don't prescribe harmful drugs to adults?

Over the years, numerous drugs have been taken off the market because of the harm they do. We don't expect medics to say, "This adult knows that this particular drug will increase their risk of a heart attack, but they really want it, so I'm going to prescribe it anyway."

Has anybody got the details of the article in Pubmed Central that's referenced here? The link in the post above doesn't seem to be working. Geeky of me I know, but I like to collect these things!

"This adult knows that this particular drug will increase their risk of a heart attack, and they have no medical need for it but they really want it because they say it will make them feel good, so I'm going to prescribe it anyway."

Why don't we apply this same prescribing policy to diazepam and codeine?

Here it is:

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6636681/

Many women will have experienced difficulty getting HRT from their doctor, but cross sex hormones are ok? It’s just politics and fear from the medical community. It’s wrong to let people harm their bodies imo, especially when they are young and poorly informed.

A really good article.

Many thanks @RoyalCorgi that one works!

Wow those stats are horrible. I don't think there's any other medication that would be handed out on demand and with zero evidence base, with side effects and risks like that attached. It's purely ideology-driven and based on lies sold to the NHS by stonewall and similar. Absolutely shameful.

I have a female family member (not young) who's gone down this route and has comorbidities that make a nasty cardiovascular outcome a major risk. It's absolute insanity.

I agree it's massively frustrating that it has got this far and so much harm has been done when plenty of people have been raising the alarm for years. To watch the NHS walking straight into another totally avoidable and probably hugely costly scandal with lives lost and destroyed along the way.

But I do think in Wes we actually have a health minister who is prepared to have his mind changed by evidence and to pursue evidence-based policy. That shouldn't be remarkable for a politician but it is. Look at so many of the rest of them. He's not scared of the truth and for that reason I feel positive, and hope he stays long enough to push further change through.

Even more interesting is that the original article appeard in Annals of Internal Medicine which I've found to be quite 'woke' on many other topics, particularly where poverty and inequality are concerned.

A very large data-set about effects is also available from East Germany's historic doping regime. (Not news, but worth bringing up again. Here is a recent Substack essay, in line with other histories I have read: https://open.substack.com/pub/genderstats/p/doped-then-transitioned-now)

It's wild that all the rules and ethics go out of the window as soon as 'gender' is mentioned.

My dad has collapsed discs in his neck and is in agony, depressed, can hardly move his head. He sometimes gets prescribed a 7 day course of anti-inflammatory steroids (with antibiotics) for chest infections, and a good side effect is they really help with his neck pain.

He went to his GP last week to ask for better pain meds and mentioned the steroids are the only thing that's ever helped relieve the pain, but his GP has told him he can't take them long term because of the heart attack/disease and bone thinning risks. He ended up crying and begging in desperation but, understandably, she couldn't prescribe them for pain relief.

But declare a gender identity and it's ''sure, crack on. Increase your risk of cancer and fuck your heart, bones, brain, liver and fertility up all you like''.

It doesn't make sense?

deleting - duplicate

Also how does all this tie in with the NHS and various medical bodies pushing the bananas idea that sex isn’t binary, or doesn’t really exist or matter etc? Why then (and how) are they giving people opposite sex hormones to try to make them into the sex they are not? And how do they know which type to give them?

There’s many links here, too:
https://mungeribabu.substack.com/p/estrogen-is-really-bad-for-men
Good luck.

Thank you, everyone. Some really useful information and ideas in this discussion.

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