this post was submitted on 13 Mar 2024

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Children will not be prescribed puberty blockers at gender identity clinics, NHS says (www.itv.com)

submitted 7 months ago by Stopthatgirl7@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

37 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Children will no longer be prescribed puberty blockers at gender identity clinics, NHS England has confirmed.

The government said it welcomed the “landmark decision”, adding it would help ensure care is based on evidence and is in the “best interests of the child”.

The NHS England policy document, published on Tuesday, said: “We have concluded that there is not enough evidence to support the safety or clinical effectiveness of (puberty blockers) to make the treatment routinely available at this time.”

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[–] Burn_The_Right@lemmy.world 34 points 7 months ago (1 children)

There is no "good conservative" alive today. Not even one.

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world -1 points 7 months ago

Never has been. It's just more obvious now.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 25 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, probably best to wait until they're adults to prescribe them puberty blockers, am I right?

[+] faintwhenfree@lemmus.org -10 points 7 months ago (6 children)

Yeah i dont understand some things. I support gender transition and LGBTQ community with all my heart, but I myself supporting it for adults, 10-11yo kids are stupid af. Unless there is a scientific way to objectively determine gender (which I don't think is possible) we shouldn't allow children or stupid parents that think they know their child from fucking up their future.

Would we take opportunity from a genuine trans person to transition relatively easily, sure. But i can't see myself supporting it if it also comes with a massive chance of messing up straight kids that are figuring their shit out that about their sexuality. My one nephew thought he was supposed to be a girl for a year straight when he was 13 to the point doctor were concerned. He's 18 now and as comfortable with his body and his penis as it gets I guess. And my cousin who recently started feeling like a guy after her long ftm transition, he is 28 now, he says she knew at 13 that "she didn't feel like a she and should be a he".

So should I let my nephew delay his puberty because I also know my cousin wouldn't have to go through the fucked up period he went through?

I don't know, I think solution is to be accepting of people who want to change as adults and leave the kids alone.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 24 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I was being sarcastic. You can't give an adult puberty blockers.

You can give a kid puberty blockers before they go through puberty.

And yes, kids that young can know their gender identity. Such as my daughter's 13-year-old best friend.

My one nephew thought he was supposed to be a girl for a year straight when he was 13 to the point doctor were concerned.

Why were doctors concerned? There would be no reason for them to be concerned since that isn't a physical health issue. I smell bullshit.

And my cousin who recently started feeling like a guy after her long ftm transition, he is 28 now, he says she knew at 13 that “she didn’t feel like a she and should be a he”.

Two stories of "ex-trans" people in your family? Yep. Definitely bullshit.

So should I let my nephew delay his puberty

No, because he's your nephew and not your son so it isn't up to you.

I don’t know, I think solution is to be accepting of people who want to change as adults and leave the kids alone.

"More than 50% of trans and non-binary youth in US considered suicide this year, survey says"

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/dec/16/us-trans-non-binary-youth-suicide-mental-health

Your attitude is literally killing children. Looking forward to you defending it with more bullshit stories.

[–] thanks_shakey_snake@lemmy.ca 1 points 7 months ago

The second story is about a trans person, not an "ex-trans" person.

[–] Ookami38@sh.itjust.works 11 points 7 months ago

Let me ask you this. If the puberty blockers were essentially a pause button, how would you feel? If given them, instead of experiencing puberty at, say, 13, you (as a potential trans person) can take the blockers for however long until everyone is sure of which way you want to go, and then you can do that.

To my laymans understanding of puberty blockers, this is essentially how they work. Obviously, there are some risks with delayed development, but compared to other more invasive measures, this one is relatively benign.

Honestly the biggest issue with transitioning is puberty. Once you hit that line, it's a lot harder to do the work necessary. It's still doable, but I think anyone who has tried to transition post-puberty wishes they could have done it sooner. There are opportunity costs on either side.

[–] ickplant@lemmy.world 8 points 7 months ago

Tell me you don’t know how puberty blockers work without telling me you don’t know how puberty blockers work.

[–] PsychedSy@sh.itjust.works 1 points 7 months ago

I'm kinda with the UK in that I'm not convinced we have solid evidence of the best course of action. This isn't something we can know the answers to without objective, disinterested study and we need to support more research rather than finding whatever data matches our internal biases.

[+] madcaesar@lemmy.world -12 points 7 months ago (4 children)

You put my exact sentiment perfectly. I want full rights and freedoms for all LGBTQ, but messing with kids... Just doesn't seem right to me.

Does this mean that some kids will be worse off than if they had been given blockers? Yes... But until we have ways to actually fully determine and understand the brain and how self identity works we shouldn't be messing with hormones.

It's kind of how I see the legal system, better to let a few criminals go free than ever jail an innocent person. The system isn't perfect but we are limited with our knowledge and do the best we can.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 10 points 7 months ago

but messing with kids... Just doesn't seem right to me.

Does this mean that some kids will be worse off than if they had been given blockers? Yes...

So your solution for "not messing with kids" is to mess with kids?

They are puberty blockers, which are meant to delay the onset of puberty until the kid is old enough to decide themselves.

They delay a choice, whereas denying them to a trans person is you forcing them to go through a puberty they might not want.

[–] AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net 7 points 7 months ago

Puberty blockers have been used extensively in children for years for things like precocious puberty, or when a child is going through the "wrong" puberty (such as an AFAB friend of mine whose voice dropped and she started growing facial hair during puberty).

Whilst the way that they'd be prescribed is slightly different in each of these cases, the overwhelming amount of evidence we have indicates that puberty blockers are safe and that a child who stops puberty blockers will go through puberty normally, just a bit delayed.

[–] HopeOfTheGunblade@kbin.social 3 points 7 months ago

So, I'd like you to make a prediction, based on what you currently believe. What percentage of people, who went by wpath/ current dsm diagnostic criteria and treatment logic, come to regret it?

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 0 points 7 months ago

I was going to say the person you responded to had written the stupidest thing in the thread, but then I read your reply to it.

[+] GregorGizeh@lemmy.zip -12 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (4 children)

Prepare to get decimated for a thought out opinion not in line with the teachings… I agree with you though.

I firmly believe that any adult has the right to do and live with their body as they please, and is their own business and nobody else’s.

But allowing kids, who often can’t even get a piercing or tattoo before being 18, to seriously mess with their hormones in a critical stage of development seems way more irresponsible than getting some earrings. The latter can just grow shut over time.

Discovering one’s own sexual orientation and how to fit into this confusing maze of personal relations and interactions we call society is a process that I don’t believe any teenager can grasp or properly comprehend fully, that isn’t completed until some years later. Many things change, many certainties are utterly irrelevant a moment later.

Permitting them to permanently mess with their physiology in such a critical phase of development seems wildly irresponsible to me.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 29 points 7 months ago (1 children)

All puberty blockers do is pause puberty. Once you stop taking them, puberty resumes.

They are used on children for reasons other than the child being transgender. For example, precocious puberty where a child starts developing before a standard puberty age.

Should we not allow kids at that critical stage of development have their hormones messed with?

Should we also not be trying to prevent child suicide?

[+] Paddzr@lemmy.world -13 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I know you didn't read the article, but that's still allowed and the 100 kids on this treatment will continue to do so.

I came to Lemmy to get away from people going off titles alone. You're automatically arguing in bad faith if you don't even read What's being changed.

And don't give me this bullshit of "it just resumes!" Because that's not how bodies work. There's a reason puberty should happen at the right age, the entire reason for this medication btw.

I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt here. So don't waste it by coming back and shouting nonsense about medical research, something neither of us is qualified enough to understand. (And I worked for nhs mind you)

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 14 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Hmm...

And don’t give me this bullshit of “it just resumes!” Because that’s not how bodies work.

...

So don’t waste it by coming back and shouting nonsense about medical research, something neither of us is qualified enough to understand.

Seems like you think you're qualified enough...

[+] Paddzr@lemmy.world -10 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I'm not qualified but I know when I don't know everything and can smell bullshit from people underplaying a serious aspect.

The first step to knowledge is realising you don't know anything as they say. As i said, i used to work for nhs and my parent comes from a medical background. To say anything they deal with is simple or easy to understand is laughable.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 13 points 7 months ago (1 children)

"I know when I don't know everything but I know this is bullshit" is not an especially scientific attitude when approaching a scientific subject.

[–] Wirrvogel@feddit.de 19 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

Permitting them to permanently mess with their physiology in such a critical phase of development seems wildly irresponsible to me.

And do you think all these scientists and doctors haven't thought about all the problems and side effects and why it might still be necessary before they think about giving children a drug like this? Do you think it is not being closely monitored? We have many years of experience with this, not only with children with gender dysphoria.

All you see is "messing with their physiology at such a critical stage of development", what you don't see is the "mess" of watching a child go through the wrong kind of puberty and the damage it does for a lifetime, and you haven't confronted yourself with that or the corpses of young people who have killed themselves because they just couldn't take it any more.

This is something that requires knowledge, not emotion. I understand that you are uncomfortable with this process, nobody can take that away from you. Either do not think about it and leave it to the specialists, or get the knowledge to understand what you are talking about.

To take away a life-saving drug because some people who are not affected by it, do not want to face the damage and loss of life, or do not want to learn about the procedure, feel uncomfortable, is the stupidest and most evil thing I can think of. Guess who I think ist the irresponsible person here.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 17 points 7 months ago

what you don’t see is the “mess” of watching a child go through the wrong kind of puberty and the damage it does for a lifetime

Well said. My daughter's best friend is trans and his parents do support him to an extent, but not enough to have gotten him puberty blockers. So now he wears a what must be uncomfortable tight chest binder every day just so that he can look at himself in the mirror and not hate himself because he sees breasts.

This boy is 13 and he already vapes and smokes weed and he cuts himself. Would puberty blockers have prevented all of that? Probably not. I'm sure things like being forced to use the girl's bathroom and girl's locker room in school and the teachers being forced to deadname him (hooray Indiana) contribute as well. But I can't help think that his mental health would at least be more improved if he didn't have to spend his days in discomfort just to avoid hating himself whenever he sees his reflection.

[+] GregorGizeh@lemmy.zip -7 points 7 months ago (2 children)

"The most stupid and evil thing you can think of" is being about 98% supportive?

I’m well aware of what the treatment entails. Doesn’t change my belief that we are selectively ignoring risks and possible issues here that we don’t for less ideologically charged subjects teenagers dabble in.

We don’t allow kids to get tattoos, piercings, don’t allow them to skip school, don’t allow them to go out late at night. We keep them from talking to strangers, from opening bank accounts, from doing any real business actually. We keep them safe from drugs and alcohol, in many parts from the concept of sexuality in general.

Why? Because teenagers are idiots in the most confusing and uncertain stage of their lives. And we know they can’t grasp many of those choices yet, so we keep them from making them before they are fully grown.

Why is something that goes way beyond the scope of those minor transgressions we shield them from considered a choice someone at that age can make without the risk of severe, lifelong regrets?

[–] Manos@lemm.ee 9 points 7 months ago

You're mostly comparing legal and financial ramifications to self-identity. I trust a teenager more to tell me who they are than to pay back a car loan.

From the little research I've done, puberty-blockers don't have long-term effects and most kids aren't on them more than a few years. This is widely agreed upon in the medical community. There is non-biased research done on this for decades you can read up on.

Yes, being a teenager is weird and confusing. Even more so, if you feel like you live in the wrong body, I imagine. That's the exact reason puberty blockers are effective, by giving a teen a little more time to figure out their identity, without it being rushed or compounded by the effects of puberty.

[–] Wirrvogel@feddit.de 9 points 7 months ago

You admit that anything to do with gender dysphoria is more important than a minor transgression. You are right, it is more important than a tattoo, because the stakes are higher if you refuse help.

Delaying puberty does not lead to lifelong regrets, it avoids them.
Gender dysphoria is a life-threatening condition that can lead to lifelong mental health problems, self-hatred, self-harm, severe depression and suicide, and going through the wrong puberty makes it extremely worse.
To even be considered for the medication you need:

a long-standing and intense pattern of gender nonconformity or gender dysphoria.
Gender dysphoria emerged or worsened with the onset of puberty.
Coexisting psychological, medical or social problems, if any, are stable enough to begin treatment.
The adolescent has given informed consent.

Many health professionals and, where possible, parents are involved in the process.

Delaying puberty does not mean that the child has to change gender, it means giving them more time to think about it until they are of age, giving them the time to live as their preferred gender and find out if it is the right one or if they want to stay with their birth gender. At any time the child can decide to stop taking the medication and will go through puberty like any other child, just a bit late (which happens naturally for some children).

It is exactly the opposite of what you say it is. It avoids the damage of a false puberty, gives time for decision making and time to "grasp the choice and consequences" and gives them time to grow up and make the permanent decision later. Everything you say is basically pro puberty blocker.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 11 points 7 months ago

thought out opinion

Bwahahahah thanks for the laughs.

Google what puberty blockers are

They don't permanently "mess" with anything. Taking puberty blockers is just delaying the onset of a puberty one might not want to go through. They only work as long as you're on them and you can't keep taking them for the rest of your life.

So it's literally just delaying a decision until the child is old enough to make it. There's nothing irreversible or permanent about it.

"thought out opinion" "not in line with thr teachings" you sound worse than a flat-Earther ruahahahahhshah

[–] Moobythegoldensock@lemm.ee -1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Puberty blockers do not permanently mess with physiology. That’s the point: they’re like the temporary tattoos kids can stick on themselves, not permanent inn. Life-altering transition is reserved for when they’re older.

[–] Ookami38@sh.itjust.works 11 points 7 months ago (2 children)

I totally understand wanting to prevent youths who may not actually be certain what direction they want to go from making an irreversible choice. To my (admittedly shallow) understanding though, puberty blockers are pretty benign, no? They just delay what would happen, more or less, and that progress can begin again when the blocker is removed? If that's correct, then this seems like the least logical transitioning tool to be blocked. Plus, stopping puberty will probably have the biggest impact on your post transition 'success' of anything, for the level of invasiveness it has.

[–] Moobythegoldensock@lemm.ee 2 points 7 months ago

Yes, they’re pretty benign. They do have the potential to decrease bone mineralization a little (calcium doesn’t build up in the bones as well,) but generally not enough to be a huge deal in the grand scheme of things.

From a doctor’s point of view, this is like fretting over whether to take ibuprofen for your headache: sure, there’s theoretically a potential for harm, but not to the extent that it’s a serious consideration.

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

Bigotry has nothing to do with logic.

[–] Moobythegoldensock@lemm.ee 5 points 7 months ago

“We have concluded that there is not enough evidence to support the safety or clinical effectiveness of (puberty blockers) to make the treatment routinely available at this time.”

They’ve been routinely used for 40 years. Where was the concern before they started being used on trans kids? Funny how things only become unsafe when a group you want to marginalize gets to use them.

[–] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 7 months ago

As mentioned by others, this is temporary and reversible. It should be allowed before hormones make changes.