Streeting declares the puberty blocker trial 'safe'

[ArabellaSaurus]

https://archive.ph/CFzK4

'On Monday, Mr Streeting reiterated that he was not “comfortable” with the trial, which involves more than 200 people under the age of 16, but said there were significant “checks, balances and safeguards” that made it safe.

He told Sky News: “The thing I’ve had to continually weigh up is that for lots of people who have been through this sort of gender identity treatment, they describe it as life-affirming and life-saving. But there is an understandable degree of public anxiety and concern.

“The crucial reassurance is that not just anyone will be able to sign up to this trial. They will go through extensive assessment by expert clinicians locally that will be reviewed nationally, and every young person would need to assent.
“They’re not old enough to consent. They would need to assent, and they would <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.ph/o/CFzK4/www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/12/17/children-cannot-consent-puberty-blocker-trial-wes-streeting/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">need the consent of parents.

“And so there are lots of checks, balances, oversights and safeguards and constant monitoring in a way that disgracefully wasn’t there before. That’s what gives me the confidence and assurance of knowing this trial is safe.

“There is a debate about whether this is the right thing to do. I understand that, and there’s one thing we’ve learnt about this particular area of policy is that we shouldn’t silence, debate, dissent, disagreement.

“So we’ll continue to have that, and we’ll continue to be subject to scrutiny and challenge.”

Mr Streeting admitted that the children who will be involved in the trial are “very young” and that the drugs are “very strong”.

But he claimed he had tried to take the “politics out of what has been an extremely <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.ph/o/CFzK4/www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/11/25/nhs-puberty-blockers-trial-repeat-tavistock-whistleblowers/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">difficult and sensitive issue”.

Despite the research going ahead, the Health Secretary added: “I think there are still big questions about how we ever ended up in this situation where these sorts of drugs were being routinely prescribed with and we’re continuing to get into that and looking.
“There’ll be another study looking at what’s happened to that cohort of young people over time.”'

This must have been passed by an ethics committee, I would love to know who the members of that committee were…

Interesting read - this is the information guidance for parents of the children being invited to the PB trial.

https://www.kcl.ac.uk/ioppn/assets/pathways/trial/pathways-trial-participant-information-sheet-for-parents-v1.3-27.11.25.pdf

The minutes of the ethics committee meetings are here:
PATHWAYS TRIAL minutes and decision correspondence - Health Research Authority

The names of all participants have been redacted.

Going back to that quote from Cass, I'm confused.

She says: "now, of the 75 children a month who are coming to the new services, about 20% are getting these medications and, worse, testosterone and oestrogen from unlicensed and unregulated sources—and those are the ones we know about. In addition, referrals to the new services have dropped from 200 a month to only 30 a month, so we think that a large number of those young people are also being harmed through those mechanisms."

So are there 75 kids a month or 30 kids a month being referred, and surely a drop from 200 a month is a good thing?

Is there not a better way to deter kids from ordering medication online, such as pointing out how dangerous it is?

Does anyone know whether hiding the names of ethics committee participants is normal practice or not?

I have never seen names redacted from ethics committee approvals. I have submitted several protocols and run numerous trials. Was also on the R and D comittee in a teaching hospital.

I'd imagine it is due to the unhinged behaviours and personal attacks that trans political activist groups carry out now freely on anyone who says anything they dislike. I can't blame the people involved; it's not like politicians or police will do anything regardless of what the activists do. But yes, it's interesting that we now have unaccountable ethics committees - because we have unaccountable unhinged overgrown toddlers and no boundaries.

How is safe defined?

Fucksake:

' If your child was female at birth and is or might be sexually
active with a person of the opposite sex, your child will need to use
effective barrier contraception (such as a male or female condom,
diaphragm or cervical cap) as a precaution throughout the treatment
period to prevent pregnancy and against infections.'

If your child is twelve years old and sexually active, this is child abuse.

Why do I have the feeling that 'child abuse' is a very large elephant in the room?

'We also do not know whether results from
the trial more generally may be showing that there are significant harms
from this treatment, which could mean it is not a good idea to say on
GnRHa'

Is it there yet - assuming you signed publicly? Mine took a while to appear.

Crucial bit:

'If something does go wrong, and your child is harmed during the research,
you may have grounds for legal action for compensation against King’s
College London and/or SLaM NHS Foundation Trust, but you may have to
pay your legal costs. The normal National Health Service complaints
mechanisms will still be available to you (if appropriate).

And maybe why some are feeling they don’t like their body.

These changes can include breast development, growth of facial and body hair, or deepening of the voice, depending on the individual's sex assigned at birth.

Who ever wrote “sex assigned at birth” is not a scientific, unbiased person.

Puberty can be a difficult time for children and young people with gender incongruence, as the physical changes they experience may not align with their gender identity.

Puberty is difficult for all sorts of children.

I’ve got as far as page 6 (of 27) and I’ve already come across “sex registered at birth” (hooray, not activist language), “sex assigned at birth” (oh) a few paragraphs later, then “female sex at birth”. The terminology is all over the place.

I’m surprised they’re only requiring barrier methods of contraception for sexually active participants given how harmful these drugs are, although I guess hormone-based contraception options are limited going head-to-head with PBs. We can’t mess up the research eh? 🙄 I’ve seen adult trials with more stringent safeguards in place for pregnancy. Do we know what effect these drugs have on sperm? How about excluding sexually active participants instead and pulling them from the trial if they become active during the trial? (Yes, I do have teenagers and yes I do know they lie about what they are getting up to. I still think this hand-wavy approach does not convey how harmful PBs could be to a foetus and the seriousness of getting it wrong.)

Despite having only made a start I have so many more questions about how this trial got ethical approval.

This too 👆

The more I read about this, the more horrific it appears. No safeguarding, no thoughts about future impact, no consideration of abuse, pregnancy, autism or gay confusion...this is our generation's infected blood scandal.

How the fuck are the Government able to ignore the mounting outcry over this?

I’ve got as far as page 6 (of 27) and I’ve already come across “sex registered at birth” (hooray, not activist language), “sex assigned at birth” (oh) a few paragraphs later, then “female sex at birth”. The terminology is all over the place.

Quite. How can this be serious?

The children involved will be, by design, pre pubertal or early puberty.

If the HCPs involved are informed a girl of - well, did they put a lower age limit? There was discussion of saying 12 to 16, but I'm not sure they added a lower age in the end, does.anyone recall?

Let's say 12 for argument's sake.

If a girl of 12 discloses she is 'sexually active', what is a normal response for an HCP? Surely this would flag safeguarding alerts?

I'm not a HCP but I'd have hoped and expected a child presenting with 'dysphoria' and disclosing sexual abuse would require referral. No?

You would think so but one of the most sicken parts of this ideology is that it wants to pull down all of the barriers to anyone doing what they want whenever they want to whomever they want. It's the essence of Queer Theory, they want to normalise sex at any age.

Surely the Minister for Safeguarding must be absolutely all over this?

https://www.gmc-uk.org/professional-standards/the-professional-standards/0-18-years/sexual-activity

A child under 13 should normally be a automatic referral, as far as I can tell.