No child is born in the wrong body - Kemi Badenoch. Letter to Wes Streeting

[IwantToRetire]

Saw this being shared on facebook. Quote:

No child is born in the wrong body.

I cannot believe we are back to square one, with NHS England backing an experimental trial of puberty blockers on healthy, vulnerable children, ignoring the damage already done.

The No1 rule of medicine is "do no harm".
This is activist ideology masquerading as research.

I'm urging MPs of all parties to sign this letter from me and Shadow Health Secretary Stuart Andrew for Daventry, calling for Wes Streeting to step in and stop this trial before more damage is done to children who are too young to understand what they are doing to themselves.

https://www.facebook.com/kemibadenoch/posts/pfbid02c3rSBKCtNCY5qHeLVtJN94j4MhB7fZnoW159VXbzJUBdrMrDDbC3C4v6KX3W7MEbl

Badenoch has been very consistent on this issue, she has definitely been doing her research.

Didn't the Cass Report recommend the trial given the evidence wasn't strong enough yet?

Seems like the only way to settle this issue.

There is strong evidence that this 'treatment' is harmful. There is no evidence that it is beneficial to gender confused children.

How can this be ethical?

And yet the Cass Report recommended the trial so it sounds like they weren't sure either way in the end.

I'm not a medical expert but perhaps since the drug was already widely used for decades for precocious puberty (a condition my niece suffered from & went on to have children after being on puberty blockers) & off label usage is routine in medical treatments, it passed medical ethical scrutiny for trial. Serious potential side effects are common with many drugs including mental health drugs prescribed to children for ADHD.

In any case, political interference in medical treatment is very concerning however you feel about gender affirming care.

I caught this on radio 4 yesterday, this is about a TRIAL on children, to satisfy an agenda. Who in their right mind would let a child enter this trial. There was discussion on lifelong harm and children can’t contract to age 18 - completely unethical

Orr… they could go and follow-up previous patients to see their outcomes? So new trial needed. They have the information, just that no one seems to have kept track of the previous children given dangerous experimental drugs for some unknown reason.

I just posted this on the main thread about the puberty blocker trial.

Dr Cass has been widely quoted as saying this about the trial:

“My review uncovered a very weak evidence base for benefits from the use of puberty blockers for children and young people with gender dysphoria. In fact, some children had more negative than positive effects.

"However, given that there are clinicians, children and families who believe passionately in the beneficial effects, a trial was the only way forward to make sense of this.”

The evidence base for benefits from these drugs is weak.

What evidence there is indicates that they can do more harm than good.

Despite this, some clinicians as well as children and their families "believe passionately" in the beneficial effects (for which there is little to no evidence).

This statement does not point to a trial as "the only way forward". Since when did scientists weigh "passionate beliefs" against scientific evidence and decide they were of equal value?

Just stop the trial and spend the money sorting out people in A&E. I don’t pay my taxes to harm kids.

It absolutely is about satisfying an agenda.

These drugs are notorious for having appalling and long lasting side effects. In the case of serious illness such as cancer, these side effects might be seen as tolerable. For a mental condition, it is inappropriate to administer a drug with such dreadful physical side effects.

There is no evidence of benefits to gender confused children. In addition to the general side effects, taking them to halt normal puberty will mean that they never grow up to be adults with normal sexual and reproductive function. Who in their right mind could think this is ethical?

Dr Cass seems to have been persuaded (or bullied) by lobbyists to suggest a trial would be appropriate. The scientific evidence doesn't point to a trial being appropriate, but the passionate beliefs of a bunch of idealogues is being put before science.

I think Cass recommended a trial to get the activists of her back while thinking that no ethics committee would ever approve this. I have some experience with ethics committee and I was convinced this wouldn't get approval and I know I was not the only one to think that.

I really really disagree wit Cass here. A passionate belief in benefits (mostly by desperate people and also grifters) is not a good enough reason to approve a trial where we already have lots of evidence for damaging long term effects. Especially since we could try track down people who have been on blockers and gather data that way.

I saw a sad interview with a young man in the USA who had been transitioned as a child, he was sad and angry and wanted to be a man . Sadly the damage was done and he is lifelong in medication. I winder how the parents feel now.

Clinical experience being used alongside research data that shows positive outcomes sounds normal for assessing a drugs effectiveness so I'm not surprised Cass took that into consideration.

But Cass knew there was very little evidence for positive outcomes, she says that in the report, there are claims of positive outcomes but not the data to back it up whereas there is data to show negative longterm effects of PBs. And it's not only Cass who thinks there is little evidence for positive outcomes pretty much every country that carried out assessments of PB came to that conclusion.

What clinical experience are you referring to?

Passionate beliefs are not the same as clinical experience.

Yes but she had to weigh that with the clinical experience which I don't think she could discount. And 'little evidence' can mean many things including the studies involved were never on large numbers because there simply aren't many trans people or they weren't gold standard which isn't always ethical to conduct .

In terms of other countries like in Scandinavia, from my understanding they also continued the availability following an analysis of effectiveness but just restricted it to those who met a higher standard of potential for maintaining their identity including those who persistently, consistently & insistently claimed to have gender dysphoria long term.

What do you mean with "clinical experience"? Tavistock doesn't seem to have followed up on patient outcome longterm, where do we have decent records of clinical experience that aren't anecdotes?

What is this "clinical experience" you keep referring to which isn't the same as scientific research? Can you give some examples and post some links? Because at the moment it's looking distinctly like anecdotes and passionate beliefs.

Is this utter nonsense still a thing? She’s absolutely right and it’s terrifying to think some people actually believe she’s wrong 🤯🤯

I feel like I should be a cat because I love to lounge about all day, dozing and having a tickle. I feel like a cat so I am a cat! That’s madness yet feeling like you’re the opposite sex and that somehow it can be changed is delusional at best, but when you have people still facilitating this stuff and at such a young age no wonder it’s still a thing. Live like the opposite sex when you’re an adult don’t experiment on kids ffs

Yes but delaying puberty when you're not meant to have it is one thing. Delaying puberty when it is meant to happen impacts on a range of things from brain development to the inability to ever orgasm.

I can’t understand why they have.

From treating GP's & specialists.

From GP's & specialists. Cass referred to clinicians experience in her quote that you linked.

Have they actually followed up longterm outcomes? Tavistock was asked for that data and couldn't provide it.

I suspect they weigh up the potential side effects with the potential negative mental health outcomes if treatment is withheld.