Bristol Council insists women be called ‘people with ovaries’

[IwantToRetire]

The comments were made in a 39-page response to a consultation by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) on updates to its guidance, following the ruling that sex in equality laws refers to biological sex.

It wrote that “not all pregnant individuals would use the pronouns ‘she/her’” so it could lead to “emotional and psychological distress” for “trans men, non-binary, gender diverse or intersex individuals”.

“We strongly advise the use of more inclusive language such as using ‘they/them’ to refer to all individuals, or include other identities to reflect the diversity of individuals who access maternity or paternity services,” officials said.

“This could include ‘people with ovaries’ or the term ‘people who use paternity services’. We also recognise that individuals may not identify with the word maternity and prefer paternity as it is gender neutral.

“Additionally, it is unclear what support will be available to trans people who chest-feed to ensure they are protected from discrimination.”
Protections based on biological sex are “too vague”, the response added, as: “It is unclear whether it refers to anyone capable of pregnancy, or only those who were assigned female at birth.”

Council officials complained that the new guidance implies that “trans women are not ‘really’ women” and risked “creating a hostile environment in public services”.

Full article at https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/22/council-says-women-called-people-with-ovaries/

And at https://archive.is/TOgKA

Which demographic?

Trans women or trans men or non-binary people?

If they are, then you guys don't have any point at all.

We aren't right that language should be clear?

Most trans women haven't had any kind of 'bottom surgery' so you are talking about a very distinct and small group.

All this could be cleared up with language that simply refers to biology and science, not gender, so I think our point is just being proved again.

No, what I want is for healthcare information destined for female patients to use plain English to facilitate communication with the vast majority of its intended recipients.

Nobody cares if you call Suzanne "Steven" whilst he pushes his non-binary child out of his vagina.

Yeah i was looking into that Imdoan Willioghby thing. Seems like a transwoman who referred to their surgically created cervix. That's when I started to wonder if people who have had bottom surgery are more suspectible to cancer.

I appreciate that you have responded to multiple posters, but for somebody claiming to be invested in listening to patients, you seem very willing to make blanket assumptions about motivation.

That is plain English.

I imagine the list of negative health outcomes they are at increased risk of is rather long.

No it isn't.

Which would make them eligible for screening. If a smear test would suffice, then it makes sense to include them.

Literature usually goes through a panel of service users so it was deemed clear enough for them. If you do have issues comprehensive literature, we do have visual devices we can use to aid you. Pictures basically.

Why do you keep suggesting it if there is no evidence that it is true?

Anyway, they are already included. Their doctors are being negligent if they don't make it clear that they still need sex specific healthcare in accordance with their biological sex.

I would be interested to see the notes from this impact assessment. My confidence in this process is not as high as yours evidently is.

As you have explained, the cervix is the 'neck' of the womb. It allows fluids, such as menstrual blood, to pass from the uterus into the vagina and it also widens during the birth of a baby.

A neo vagina certainly has an end, and as the HPV virus also causes anal cancer, oropharyngeal cancer, penile cancer, vaginal cancer, and vulvar cancer, I don't see why it wouldn't cause cancer in a Neo-vagina. However, India Willoughby does not have a cervix.

I am postulating based on the topic of biological men having a cervix or needing cervical screening. That was a topic someone kept wanting to speak about.

Obviously they don't have a cervix, and as a healthcare practitioner you should know this.

Or do we need to add you to the category of "women who don't know what a cervix is", along with many of your patients?

Oh wait, when you say "men" do you mean men who identify as women, or women who identify as men? You see where this obfuscation of language gets us?

I dont know enough about the intricacies of sex changes to know if they do create an artifical cervix or not.

However, if the increased risk of HPV can be detected by the smear programme, then why wouldn't they be included?

If uptake was dependent on inclusive language in this population, then I see no issue with using their preferred terms for their anatomy. Whatever it is.

To do any useful research on the subject, you would need to acknowledge their sex and the nature of a neo vagina.

If you called them women with a cervix and treated them as such you would just be setting up road blocks.

As I said in one of the questions, is every artifical cervix not a cervix, or only the ones created in biological men? I assume that is why that transwoman says they have one.

A cervix is a passageway between the vagina and the uterus.

What a post-op trans identifying man has is not a cervix, it is a dead end.

India Willoughby's doctors have clearly been negligent if they have allowed him to believe that he is now female and has a cervix.

For who?

If everyone who identifies as a woman for whatever reason and who has a vagina or neovagina attends for the screening they need, where is the roadblock?

What it does is buy into their belief that they are a woman with a cervix. As HCPs, it is more important that they access heath promotion initiatives than for us to worry about that as a wider issue. Our first job is to deliver healthcare to the population and it is never our job to exclude people.

That's your opinion on trans issues. Many doctors believe the complete opposite hence their decision to specialise in such surgery.

And I am saying that what is more important is whether or not that "dead end" is more suspectible to cancer

This is not a women's health concern.

Whatever screening they need should be undertaken as part of their gender affirming care.

Any doctor who genuinely believes they have changed their patient's sex is unfit to practice and should be struck off.

And let's not pretend that most of them have altruistic reasons for deciding to specialise in this sort of Frankenstein surgery.

?

How can you possibly create an artificial cervix if you don't have a womb to connect it to?

https://genderblog.net/what-exactly-is-a-neo-vagina-then/

The link I provided gives more information.

Re: smear program, say what you want talking to individuals, but if research uses inaccurate terms you are going to kill people.

Men also get breast cancer, but aren't included in general testing for various reasons including the difficulty of performing a mammogram on a male breast. Men's and women's bodies are different and they need sex specific treatment.

Men don't have a cervix, and the tissue used to create a neo vagina will come from existing body parts that are different to a vagina or cervix, so lumping their tests in with other tests for cervixes seems like a bad idea.