Why the NHS puberty blocker trial is appalling

[Soontobe60]

Stella O’Malley from Genspect telling it like it is - that a state endorsed trial of puberty blockers for gender dysphoric children should NOT go ahead.
the NHS are not walking into this nightmare blindly - there are enough experts out there telling them what will happen happen to these children if they’re given these life changing drugs.
https://x.com/genspect/status/1989896741358113127?s=61&t=gKvvk-rWmOlYFGMZN8QVvQ

Is there anyone on mn who have a transgender child and welcome puberty blockers. All we read here is the cons. Nobody ever speaks of the pros. Im sure its for fear of being shot down in flames!

All we read is children having bodies mutilated, reassignment surgery on children, which is all bullshill as it doesn't happen. But just curious to read it from a trans parent point of view.

Yes, I have these questions, too.

We know that historically 98% of children who go on PBs go on to cross sex hormones. Has that been approved? Are they legal for minors? Is it part of the trial??

Or are they just going to stop and start puberty and then say right, how do you feel??

Is it just to see the effects of puberty blockers? Start them, stop them, ask them how they feel, test their bones and IQ. Job done?

Because what if the effects of bone crumbling and reduced IQ, plus depression only happen after four years, not two? Or eight ?

The fact that Hilary Cass approved of this does make me wonder whether it's the criteria to even start them that she wants to be made transparent.

Root out the ideology entirely, and you're just left with what we had before, a very rare mental condition.

I still don't see how children can consent, though.

can’t follow thread today as v busy; yes the sheep ones.

they often use sheep for these experiments as they’ve very similar brains (apparently)

It's not clear what that would add.

You can find people who claim that their cancer was cured by all sorts of things, but if they don't have the evidence to back that up, it's not helpful.

As discussed above, one of the biggest problems with the trial is that it is not clear what is being treated.

Kindly, maybe you should go and read some of Kiera Bell’s writing - or indeed that of any detransitioner. Or Hannah Barnes’ excellent book on the Tavistock and why it was shut down. People are speaking about the cons because that’s all there are - there are no discernible pros to the use of puberty blockers, as meta study after meta study have found.

I spent some time looking into the sheep stuff on threads here a long time ago, with others.

they’ve done two separate ones as far as I can tell.

I hope that @MyThreeWordsis correct and that this trial will turn out, in reality, to be about the issues of recruitment and will be stopped early on ethical grounds.

I’m also struck by this from Hannah Barnes

Consent from one parent will also be required.
Now hang on a minute. Although it is true to say that medical interventions on children - usually - only require the signature of one parent, if parents disagree about treatment, unless it is an emergency situation, that procedure cannot go ahead unless both parents reach agreement or it is settled in court.

It’s not unreasonable to suggest that parental separation will be an issue for some children presenting with GD. Surely, surely, surely this cannot go ahead with only one parent pushing it?

I hope to goodness that the opaque statement about needing a suitable family situation means this has been thought through.

'make-believe or fantasy play, toys, games, or activities and playmates that are typical of the experienced gender rather than the assigned sex'

'Experienced gender'

Can we look at this phrase? How does one 'experience' gender?

One 'experiences' gender, but apparently not sex, whixh is 'assigned'? Why suggest sex is not 'experienced'? According to this, biological sex is imposed, but gender stereotypes are innate?

A boy choosing barbies proves that femininity is an arbitrarily imposed norm. It does not prove that the boy is a girl.

The boy may choose a Barbie for any number of reasons. And the response to him choosing a Barbie is where things appear to have gone weird.

https://www.transgendertrend.com/teenage-brain/

"Dr Sallie Baxendale is a Consultant Clinical Neuropsychologist with 29 years of experience working as a clinician in the NHS. She has strong clinical and research interests in the impact of drugs on cognitive function and brain development. In this article she examines the capabilities of the teenage brain and how puberty blockers may impact brain development."

I have heard Dr Baxendale speak about the effects of puberty blockers on the brain; it's terrifying that they are willing to experiment on children like this. Her academic papers are well worth a read.

It’s weird to think that if they threatened to experiment with PBs on baby monkeys you’d have the lefty SJWs calling it out as animal cruelty (and they would have a point) but for a human child they are not remotely bothered. Such a strange world we are living in.

I am so angry and downright sad about this.

Who on earth approved the study? How did it get through ethics approval? Who in their right mind would agree to be a doctor involved in this?

They have enough evidence of the harms surely and as Keira says, girls don’t even need puberty blockers to stop them passing as male if they decide to take testosterone later on.

I hope that a court case will stop it going ahead. But it’s like bloody whackamole trying to stop all this shit - just when you think reason has won the day some other craziness pops up.

1. privacy - if you don't have prior consent you can't legally
2. if you tried to recruit them through adverts, you would get a biased sample
3. is an approach I'm guess they have thought of and worked out whether they would get the numbers to study what was significant

There will be more regulatory blockers than pure incompetence I'd guess

What do you imagine the pros might be?

Children no longer have surgery due in no small part to women's work on exposing what was going on. Fifteen year old girls were sent from Scotland to England for double mastectomies just a few years back.

My cousin's child transitioned and started on testosterone. So not puberty blockers, she was too old at that point.

She took T for a year or two and then realised that 'living as a man' was not the answer to her mental health issues and began to accept herself as a gay woman. She detransitioned and returned to her old name, etc.

She's off T but has been left with considerable health issues as a result of taking it. Doctors have not been able to do much to alleviate her problems or even tell her how long they might last.

I appreciate this is not the view you asked for or presumably what you want to hear. But just so you understand where 'gender affirming healthcare' can lead.

Agree completely. Just at the point where we think the madness is coming to an end, this pops up. There are two arguments against it:

1. It is profoundly unethical to the point of being downright evil. It is deliberately causing harm to children and then waiting to see what happens.
2. It is insane. It is premised on a world view that is completely irrational and anti-scientific. You might as well drop babies from a high building because you believe they can fly.

The people involved in this trial are either wicked or stupid or both, and the best place for them is behind bars.

Surely it's biased from the start with a self selecting cohort.
Identifying as transgender and having parental consent.

What an absolute disgrace.

How the fuck has this passed the ethical review.

And what compensation will they be offered in the future?
Are they all being screened for underlying conditions that should preclude them?

https://www.thetimes.com/uk/scotland/article/scottish-doctors-approved-breast-removal-for-51-trans-teenagers-qvkmz8r2c

When everyone said 'it won't get through ethics'...and we said 'They will find a way'...it seems they found a way.

Anyway, to couch this as a trial that is needed to carry on is a complete falsehood. The Tavistock started out with a trial, that was originally turned down by ethics boards and they kept going until someone approved it. Then they decided to ignore their own trial age barriers. It's been trialled for 3 decades nearly. They already have data. They just decided to let the adult clinics hide it. The guy in charge of the trial is now high up in the NHS.

This will just keep on happening until doctors get jailed for it. It isn't a surprise.

1. privacy - if you don't have prior consent you can't legally

This came up when Cass did her review. The hospitals refused to hand over the data. But they can be forced by “mandatory direction” without the consent of individual patients. (Detail in article below). I don’t know if this inquiry has gone ahead but it seems incredible to me that they wouldn’t wait for the results before embarking on new research.

“Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, said he was “pretty angry” to learn about the blocking tactics. “Under a Labour government there will be accountability for that – you’re not going to get away with it,” he said.”

“In the same letter NHS England made clear to the trusts that if they do not disclose the details, they will resort to “mandatory direction in this respect” to compel them to do so.”

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/apr/10/adult-transgender-clinics-in-england-face-inquiry-into-patient-care#:~:text=Mermaids%2C%20a%20charity%20supporting%20trans,learn%20about%20the%20blocking%20tactics.

Impossible to do any sort of scientific study when you don't even have a coherent hypothesis in the first place. Gender this gender that. Actually explain what you think you're testing in plain language and you'd sound like a raving lunatic. I think it was the perfect move to get philosophers on board for the US HHS report since virtually none of this is about evidence or medicine, it's about language and ethics.

Here’s the thing. The original Dutch protocol didn’t propose the use of puberty blockers to “give children time to think” about whether they were trans or not. They did it because they had a cohort of adult male transsexuals who had gone through medicalisation, and who came out the other side and were still not happy. And the Dutch researchers, on the basis of nothing whatsoever, decided that the transsexuals weren’t happy because they didn’t “pass” well enough as the opposite sex, because they had gone through puberty and the medicalisation couldn’t reverse the physical changes that had happened. And so the researchers said let’s take some kids who haven’t yet gone through puberty, and stop them going through puberty and then see if they “pass” better, because we’ve decided that if they pass better, that will solve all their problems.

No science there what so fucking ever.

One of the kids in the original protocol died, because as a result of taking blockers, his penis was too small to invert. They used part of his colon to create a neovagina and he died of sepsis.

Its insane. Children CANNOT consent to life changing medications 😡

reassignment surgery on children, which is all bullshill as it doesn't happen

Yes it does. It’s happened throughout the world.

Ah but they can if they are life saving, which is why the TRAs came up with the whole “would you rather have a live son or a dead daughter?” nonsense.

I’ve just read the Times article. This bit is quoted from the psychiatrist leading the trial:

Simonoff said the trial would assess three main potential risks and harms of puberty blockers: decreased bone strength, long-term damage to fertility and “the impact on brain development and brain function”. Potential benefits include reducing anxiety and depression, and “better alignment between body features and long-term identity”.

Hang on. I seem to remember reading something about the original Dutch protocol and a child who presented with anxiety or depression would automatically be excluded from taking part. What are the study’s exclusion criteria going to be?