Children and teens in England who experience gender dysphoria will no longer be prescribed puberty blockers by the National Health Service (NHS). Existing data found that there isn’t enough to back up the safety or clinical efficacy of hormones that suppress puberty.
The 2018 independent evaluation of transgender treatments among children by NHS England and a subsequent public consultation led to the prohibition. The only group that will have access to puberty inhibitors are children participating in clinical trials.
The NHS will launch two new services in April, which will provide children with a more comprehensive approach to healthcare by using clinical technicians who have expertise in neurodiversity, mental health, and pediatrics.
According to a report, the review’s head, Dr. Hilary Cass, said in an interim report dated February 2022 that a new facility needed to be established to better care for children and that the current system should be abandoned. She voiced her worry about the scarcity of data about the long-term effects of hormone blockers and other drugs on children.
The former prime minister of the UK, Liz Truss, has urged the government to outlaw the sale of hormone medications in private pharmacies. The decision by NHS England to stop routinely prescribing puberty blockers to youths for gender dysphoria was applauded. Truss urged the government to support her bill and make it law.
The use of puberty blockers and hormones on children is fraught with conceptual and methodological problems, according to German research released at the end of February. Additionally, the study discovered that these operations had no positive effect on the mental health of children.
Reports reveal that the United Kingdom, Norway, and Finland have all concluded that hormone therapies and puberty blockers do not have enough proof to justify their use. According to Norway, these techniques should be considered experimental therapies.
Many transgender adolescents outgrow their condition. Decades of studies demonstrate that between 65 and 94% of transgender youths abandon those identities as adults.
