Sweet Moonshine
Registered Member
Increasingly, gender therapists and physicians argue that children as young as nine should be given puberty-blocking drugs if they experience gender dysphoria.
But a new article by three medical experts reveals that there is little scientific evidence to support such a radical procedure.
Meanwhile, despite claims by advocates, there is no evidence that puberty blocking is “reversible,” nor that it is harmless. Most concerning of all is that these treatments run the risk that children may persist in their gender dysphoria.
As a result, if “the increasing use of gender-affirming care does cause children to persist with their identification as the opposite sex, then many children who would otherwise not need ongoing medical treatment would be exposed to hormonal and surgical interventions.
Whereas 80 to 95 percent of children with gender dysphoria will come to identify with and embrace their biological sex, none of the children placed on puberty blockers in the Dutch clinic that pioneered this treatment came to identify with their biological sex. All of them persisted in their
The Dutch doctors who pioneered puberty blocking as a treatment for gender dysphoria argue that it would give a child “more time to explore their gender identity, without the distress of the developing secondary sex characteristics.”
This is an odd argument. As Hruz, Mayer, and McHugh explain, “It presumes that natural sex characteristics interfere with the ‘exploration’ of gender identity, when one would expect that the development
of natural sex characteristics might contribute to the natural consolidation of one’s gender identity.”
The sad reality is that prolonged puberty suppression as a treatment for gender dysphoria has “been accepted so rapidly by much of the medical community, apparently without scientific scrutiny, that there is reason to be concerned about the welfare of children who are receiving it, as well as reason to question the veracity of some of the claims made to support its use—such as the assertion that it is physiologically and psychologically ‘reversible.’”
Puberty Blocking Isn’t ‘Reversible’
Indeed, the way that activists talk makes it seem like normal human development is an irreversible problem, but interfering with development is a cautionary and fully reversible step.
But actually the opposite is true, as Hruz, Mayer, and McHugh explain:
But doctors have no way of knowing whether these treatments truly are reversible, because very few people have ever sought to have them reversed: “There are virtually no published reports, even case studies, of adolescents withdrawing from puberty-suppressing drugs, and then resuming the normal
pubertal development typical for their sex.
Or, at least, perhaps not in a normal way. After all, as Hruz, Mayer, and McHugh explain, “In developmental biology, it makes little sense to describe anything as ‘reversible.’”
Going through a developmental process at age 20 that should take place at age 10 is not the same thing. So talk about
these treatments being reversible is inherently misleading.
And yet all of the major activist groups—and many professional groups—perpetuate this claim.
But as Hruz, Mayer, and McHugh illustrate, “If a child does not develop certain characteristics at age 12 because of a medical intervention, then his or her developing those characteristics at age 18 is not a ‘reversal,’ since the sequence of development has already been disrupted.”
Some snippets from the Daily Signal.
I also read yesterday, that hormone blockers had been given to very young children and that had caused infertility in those young children.
But a new article by three medical experts reveals that there is little scientific evidence to support such a radical procedure.
Meanwhile, despite claims by advocates, there is no evidence that puberty blocking is “reversible,” nor that it is harmless. Most concerning of all is that these treatments run the risk that children may persist in their gender dysphoria.
As a result, if “the increasing use of gender-affirming care does cause children to persist with their identification as the opposite sex, then many children who would otherwise not need ongoing medical treatment would be exposed to hormonal and surgical interventions.
Whereas 80 to 95 percent of children with gender dysphoria will come to identify with and embrace their biological sex, none of the children placed on puberty blockers in the Dutch clinic that pioneered this treatment came to identify with their biological sex. All of them persisted in their
The Dutch doctors who pioneered puberty blocking as a treatment for gender dysphoria argue that it would give a child “more time to explore their gender identity, without the distress of the developing secondary sex characteristics.”
This is an odd argument. As Hruz, Mayer, and McHugh explain, “It presumes that natural sex characteristics interfere with the ‘exploration’ of gender identity, when one would expect that the development
of natural sex characteristics might contribute to the natural consolidation of one’s gender identity.”
The sad reality is that prolonged puberty suppression as a treatment for gender dysphoria has “been accepted so rapidly by much of the medical community, apparently without scientific scrutiny, that there is reason to be concerned about the welfare of children who are receiving it, as well as reason to question the veracity of some of the claims made to support its use—such as the assertion that it is physiologically and psychologically ‘reversible.’”
Puberty Blocking Isn’t ‘Reversible’
Indeed, the way that activists talk makes it seem like normal human development is an irreversible problem, but interfering with development is a cautionary and fully reversible step.
But actually the opposite is true, as Hruz, Mayer, and McHugh explain:
But doctors have no way of knowing whether these treatments truly are reversible, because very few people have ever sought to have them reversed: “There are virtually no published reports, even case studies, of adolescents withdrawing from puberty-suppressing drugs, and then resuming the normal
pubertal development typical for their sex.
Or, at least, perhaps not in a normal way. After all, as Hruz, Mayer, and McHugh explain, “In developmental biology, it makes little sense to describe anything as ‘reversible.’”
Going through a developmental process at age 20 that should take place at age 10 is not the same thing. So talk about
these treatments being reversible is inherently misleading.
And yet all of the major activist groups—and many professional groups—perpetuate this claim.
But as Hruz, Mayer, and McHugh illustrate, “If a child does not develop certain characteristics at age 12 because of a medical intervention, then his or her developing those characteristics at age 18 is not a ‘reversal,’ since the sequence of development has already been disrupted.”
Some snippets from the Daily Signal.
I also read yesterday, that hormone blockers had been given to very young children and that had caused infertility in those young children.
