(CP) The NHS says it is going to stop providing puberty-blocking drugs for youngsters with gender dysphoria, save for when the drugs are a part of a clinical trial.
NHS England made the announcement on Tuesday, following several months of research and a review of evidence provided by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).
“NHS England has fastidiously considered the evidence review conducted by NICE and further published evidence available so far,” a spokesperson for the NHS said, as quoted by The Guardian.
“We have concluded that there is just not enough evidence to support the protection or clinical effectiveness of puberty suppressing hormones to make the treatment routinely available right now.”
Maria Caulfield, parliamentary under secretary of state on the Department of Health and Social Care, praised the NHS’s plan of action, calling it a “landmark decision.”
“We welcome this landmark decision by the NHS to finish the routine prescription of puberty blockers and this guidance which recognises that care should be based on evidence, expert clinical opinion and in one of the best interests of the kid,” said Caulfield in a press release shared with media.
“The NHS must ensure its Gender Identity Services protect, support and act in one of the best interests of youngsters and we are going to proceed to work with NHS England to guard children on this area.”
Former Prime Minister Liz Truss, who stays a member of Parliament, tweeted that she supported the NHS decision and is championing laws to expand this ban to incorporate private entities.
Last June, NHS England issued interim guidance stating that it is going to restrict the usage of puberty blockers for gender dysphoric children, citing research overseen by Dr. Hillary Cass, the previous president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health.
The government entity also established a Children and Young People’s Gender Dysphoria Research Oversight Board, which was tasked with researching the impact of puberty-suppressing hormones on minors.
Amid an exponential increase in children being referred to an NHS gender identity clinic within the last decade, Cass published an independent review in 2022, finding that “social transitioning” is just not a “neutral act” and will have “significant effects” when it comes to “psychological functioning.” Her review led to shuttering the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust’s gender identity clinic in favor of more local clinics.
“The rationale to be used of puberty blockers at Tanner Stage 2 of development was based on data that demonstrated that children, particularly birth-registered boys who had early gender incongruence, were unlikely to desist once they reached early puberty; this rationale doesn’t necessarily apply to later-presenting young people, including the predominant referral group of birth-registered girls,” Cass wrote.
“We don’t fully understand the role of adolescent sex hormones in driving the event of each sexuality and gender identity through the early teen years, so by extension we cannot ensure concerning the impact of stopping these hormone surges on psychosexual and gender maturation. We due to this fact haven’t any way of knowing whether, slightly than buying time to make a choice, puberty blockers may disrupt that decision-making process.”
The NHS also proposed guidelines in October 2022 urging doctors to not so easily encourage minors to socially transition by changing their names or pronouns during what could also be a “transient phase.”
© The Christian Post
