Drugs offered to transgender children need to be used more cautiously

A rising number of girls wish to be boys and boys wish to be girls and a rising number of them are taking drugs to block puberty. In Britain cases of children being treated for gender dysphoria by the National Health Service remain rare, but in the past decade they have climbed at a rate of 50% year on year (see chart). In America the number of gender clinics treating children has increased from just one in 2007 to perhaps 50 today.

This has bothered lawmakers. In America several states want to ban giving puberty-blocking drugs to children (see article). In Britain the high court is considering the judicial review of a clinic which complainants believe has been handing out puberty blockers too freely (see article).
The use of such drugs raises thorny questions about who decides what can happen to a child’s body and why. Put aside the culture wars, if you can. This debate should be settled in the interests of the child. Yet those can be very hard to discern.
Puberty blockers prevent adolescents from developing secondary sexual characteristics like breasts or a beard. They almost always set off a cascade of interventions that involve “cross-sex” hormones and later may also include gender-reassignment surgery. The main purpose of puberty blockers is to bring comfort to people with gender dysphoria, by sparing them the experience of, say, becoming more like a woman if they are a girl who wishes to be a boy. They also make most future surgery less severe.

However, the combination of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones also leads to irreversible changes which, if they start early in puberty, include sterility. About a dozen studies of gender-dysphoric children who did not take puberty blockers have found that most of them, if supported by counselling, are happy with their sex once they emerge from puberty. The share often cited is 85% and many of them turn out to be gay. One sign that something is wrong is that more people are “detransitioning”—re-identifying with their biological sex. Most of them are girls who wanted to be boys when they were in their teens. If they took puberty blockers and then cross-sex hormones early they would be sterile for life, even if they did not have hysterectomies.

As of now, there is no way to distinguish the 15% or so of children who will transition successfully from the 85% who might have been happy with the gender of their birth if they had received counselling alone. Some claim that withholding puberty blockers adds to the burden on vulnerable children with gender-dysphoria and may lead to higher rates of suicide.

Choosing whom to treat is a judgment of Solomon. The decision to intervene is made harder by a reckless disregard for data. The academic studies purporting to show the higher suicide risk among trans children are unconvincing. Clinics do not publish enough studies on the effects of various treatments on their patients. Too little research compares children who have had treatment with those who have not. The field needs a better understanding of the long-term effects of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. Every child who is treated should be enrolled in a long-term follow-up study.

This should be with their informed consent. But so should the treatment itself. Today children and parents are not always fully informed about the potentially grave consequences of starting on puberty blockers. Their effects are often described as largely reversible—and the effects of cross-sex hormones that are almost always taken with them are not.

To ban puberty blockers in all circumstances would be unjustified. Not only would it be harsh on some children, but it would also leave the issue permanently obscured for lack of new research. However, today’s rush into treatment smacks of a fad. Many adolescents feel unhappy with the way they were made. Transitioning will be solace for some. But for others it will be a dreadful mistake. ■

An excellent article on the dangers of ramming puberty blockers down confused childrens throats.

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2020/01/30/what-to-do-about-puberty-blockers

Would be lovely if we could read it - not all of us subscribe. But yes I get the gist of things - there has been a lot in the press about this recently. If you contradict anyones opinion who says that kids should be given these drugs, you are accused of being a dinosaur, ignoring their true feelings, not being woke, politically incorrect etc

Giving drugs to young kids in this way is WRONG on so many levels. These children need mental support, not pharmaceuticals

I think that it depends from person to person. If some geezer rocks up and says I'm trans gimme drugs then you shouldn't do that immediately, but if there's a person who's been feeling this way for years, has tried to change their look to whatever gender they would like to be, etc, then you could, because it'd be more unlikely.

Using myself as an example:
Knew I was trans since before I was five years old. Long hair, painted nails, fairly androgynous clothes, don't use male bathrooms, shave as regularly as possible, stuff like that. I've felt gender dysphoria for over a decade, and I take as many measures as I can take to look like a girl as I can. I think that it's fairly unlikely looking at my history that if you give me puberty blockers or HRT or something I'm gonna roll out of bed the next day and say "oh wait I was wrong I'm actually a bloke".
On the other hand, one of my friends told me a few months ago that they recently started to feel mild gender dysphoria. In their case, they only recently started feeling it and they said it was pretty mild. For them, I wouldn't give them puberty blockers or HRT or whatever - I would wait a few years, see if it becomes worse, see how it develops, etc.


It's bad to put a blanket over it and say no one can have it, because there's a difference between people who want puberty blockers after one day of feeling gender dysphoria, and people who want puberty blockers after 11 years of gender dysphoria.

An excellent article on the dangers of ramming puberty blockers down confused childrens throats.


https://www.economist.com/leaders/2020/01/30/what-to-do-about-puberty-blockers

I think that it depends from person to person. If some geezer rocks up and says I'm trans gimme drugs then you shouldn't do that immediately, but if there's a person who's been feeling this way for years, has tried to change their look to whatever gender they would like to be, etc, then you could, because it'd be more unlikely.

Using myself as an example:
Knew I was trans since before I was five years old. Long hair, painted nails, fairly androgynous clothes, don't use male bathrooms, shave as regularly as possible, stuff like that. I've felt gender dysphoria for over a decade, and I take as many measures as I can take to look like a girl as I can. I think that it's fairly unlikely looking at my history that if you give me puberty blockers or HRT or something I'm gonna roll out of bed the next day and say "oh wait I was wrong I'm actually a bloke".
On the other hand, one of my friends told me a few months ago that they recently started to feel mild gender dysphoria. In their case, they only recently started feeling it and they said it was pretty mild. For them, I wouldn't give them puberty blockers or HRT or whatever - I would wait a few years, see if it becomes worse, see how it develops, etc.


It's bad to put a blanket over it and say no one can have it, because there's a difference between people who want puberty blockers after one day of feeling gender dysphoria, and people who want puberty blockers after 11 years of gender dysphoria.

An excellent article on the dangers of ramming puberty blockers down confused childrens throats.


https://www.economist.com/leaders/2020/01/30/what-to-do-about-puberty-blockers

I guess that cobfusion no doubt follows said kids into adult life and is also present in all gay people?

Hang on a sec! As a man I have been married for over 10 years and as a kid knew I was a boy and was attracted to girls. Now I think about it, perhaps I was / am confused?

Our thoughts, our feelings are often products of life experience, cultural influence and environmental pressure. Our thoughts and feelings are not reliable indicators of what is certain of our reality. Our thoughts and feelings are often disconnected from reality.

True. But when I was 5 I knew I found girls pretty and when I was 11 I knew which girls in my class I was attracted to. Or was I just confused by your measure?

This is my issue. Children who have socially defined views on life that are considered normal go unchallenged. Yet those with alternative views are somehow detached from reality and confused. I find that just patronising. What children need is support, empathy and understanding.

You do know theres a reason why we don’t let 5 year olds live independently on their own, right?

Why would them not wanting their 5 year old son dressing as a princess make them not caring? We really do live in the time of the snowflake dont we. Why should being transgender or gay be encouraged? Its like that Philip Scofield suddenly deciding he is gay and people thinking he is some sort of hero comparable to Nelson Mandela.. ****ing ridiculous.

What exactly is wrong with a 5 year old boy dressing as a princess?

True. But when I was 5 I knew I found girls pretty and when I was 11 I knew which girls in my class I was attracted to. Or was I just confused by your measure?

This is my issue. Children who have socially defined views on life that are considered normal go unchallenged. Yet those with alternative views are somehow detached from reality and confused. I find that just patronising. What children need is support, empathy and understanding.