Originally published in Decision Magazine
The Trump administration’s Department of Health and Human Services has released a robust report condemning puberty blockers and sex-change surgeries for minors.
The 400-page document, titled Treatatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria: Review of Evidence and Best Practices, was released last week following an executive order from President Trump in January aimed at prohibiting medical gender procedures for children and teenagers suffering from gender dysphoria.
The HHS’ report was critical of both medicinal interventions like cross-sex hormones and puberty blockers, as well as various surgeries, including cosmetic procedures intended to make young people look more like the opposite sex. Instead, it calls for broader use of psychotherapy for kids and teens struggling with gender identity.
“These interventions carry risk of significant harms including infertility/sterility, sexual dysfunction, impaired bone density accrual, adverse cognitive impacts, cardiovascular disease and metabolic disorders, psychiatric disorders, surgical complications, and regret,” the report’s foreword states.
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The report specifically called to task the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH). HHS pointed out that the global body’s advocacy of so-called gender-affirming care for minors has become “embedded in nearly all aspects of healthcare”— despite a clear lack of evidence-based review. The department also noted that WPATH has lobbied for adolescents to seek medical interventions without parental permission.
Contributors to the report included doctors, medical ethicists and one methodologist.
HHS’ report comes a year after the United Kingdom’s National Health Service released the Cass Report, which highlighted similar concerns about the use of such hormonal and surgical procedures on children and teens. Both reports strongly emphasise the side effects of these interventions, which are considered largely irreversible.
“Our duty is to protect our nation’s children — not expose them to unproven and irreversible medical interventions,” said NIH Director Dr Jay Bhattacharya. “We must follow the gold standard of science, not activist agendas.”
Theologian Albert Mohler praised the HHS’ report. “As a Christian, I want to say it is very consistent with the affirmation of creation order,” he said. “It is very consistent with the affirmation of what you might call just basic sanity here.”
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