France's National Academy of Medicine goes public with concerns about the "epidemic-like" spread of youth gender dysphoria & calls for "great medical caution" in the use of hormonal & surgical treatments. @acadmed@SEGMtweets#GenderClinics 1/
The academy highlights side-effects of puberty blockers followed by cross-sex hormones -- "such as the impact on growth, bone weakening, risk of sterility, emotional & intellectual consequences & for girls, menopause-like symptoms".
Statement in French - academie-medecine.fr/la-medecine-fa…
The academy advises psychological support for youth struggling with gender & warns parents to monitor "the addictive role of excessive engagement with social media", which plays a "very significant part" in the international explosion of teenage gender dysphoria.
So, add France to the growing list of countries showing concern about youth gender clinics -- Sweden, Finland, the UK, the Netherlands, the US, Australia & New Zealand. Have I missed any? (The degree of concern varies & doesn't necessarily involve any action or reform.)
The French academy cites (but understates) the dramatic rise in new patients at Australia's biggest youth gender clinic @RCHMelbourne. The French say RCH went from 1 patient in 2003 to nearly 200 now. In fact, *new referrals* rose from 1 in 2003 to 473 new referrals in 2020.
"Rather than weaponizing child protective services against loving families, child welfare agencies should expand access to gender-affirming care for transgender children." President Biden on Texas classifying medicalised gender change as "child abuse". 1/ whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/…
.@POTUS stated that "respected medical organizations have said that access to gender-affirming care for transgender children can benefit mental health, lower suicide rates, and improve other health outcomes".
But there is not really good evidence to support "gender-affirming care" -- i.e. gender change with puberty blockers & cross-sex hormones -- according to Sweden's National Board of Health & Welfare, armed with results of an independent expert review.
Swedish health authorities say the claim of low regret after medicalised gender change “no longer stands unchallenged” & cite Lisa Littman's 2021 detransitioners study, where only 24% went back to the clinic to report treatment regret. #Socialstyrelsen 1/ genderclinicnews.substack.com/p/sweden-trans…
US trans clinician Erica Anderson says the world should pay careful attention to Sweden's new cautious policy on puberty blockers & cross-sex hormones for minors. @eanderh@genspect@SEGMtweets
Dr Anderson says the rushed medicalisation of some young people "raises the prospect of a larger proportion of future detransitioners/desisters". @detrans_voices@FtMdetransed@LisaLittman1
.@ABCMediaWatch didn't bother to check & got it wrong. In September, faithful to gender clinic dogma, they dismissed one of my contacts, US endocrinologist Will Malone, as "a conservative Christian doctor from Idaho, who specialises in diabetes".
With remarkable consistency, Australia's public broadcaster the ABC implies that only right-wing Christians are worried about the safety & ethics of medicalised gender change for minors, so that "gender affirming" medicine is not only blessed by science but "progressive".
It's just not true. Concern about unnecessary medicalisation of youth cuts across the social & political divides. The rise & spread of groups of health professionals, parents & detransitioners often with little else in common apart from child welfare is a remarkable story.
In Australia, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the "affirmative" model of medicalised gender change for under-18s has outsourced its media management to the public broadcaster @abcnews@ABCaustralia
Last night @ABCmediawatch was on task again, implying that only Christians are worried about the global spike in atypical cases of gender dysphoria among adolescents, mostly girls. abc.net.au/mediawatch/epi…
Professor of paediatrics John Whitehall was one of my first contacts. I read his Quadrant articles. Since 2015 he has immersed himself in the literature on youth gender dysphoria. He happens to be Christian, but that cannot negate his medical arguments. quadrant.org.au/magazine/2018/…
"(As a parent said to me), 'I’m sick of my daughter in Year 7 coming home & saying to me, 'Dad, English today was gender studies again'. And then when I complain to the school, I feel like a second-class citizen. I can’t get anywhere.” Australian politician @RealMarkLatham 1/
Parliament in the most populous state of NSW has just tabled a committee report into Latham's draft law to expel "gender fluidity" from the classroom. The committee has opted for tighter education policy, rather than a change in the law.
The report recommends the NSW centre-right government to "urgently review & overhaul the Controversial Issues in Schools Policy to afford greater priority & deference to parental rights & to provide, procedurally, more robust protections for parental authority".
"This guide will help journalists understand the history of LGBTQ participation in sport & provide facts &
context to support accurate, respectful & inclusive coverage" A 20-page guide was given to journos at the women's weightlifting with NZ trans competitor Laurel Hubbard. 1/
Was distribution of these guidelines at the Tokyo Olympics -- guidelines which touch on polarised & emotive conflicts of rights & interests -- at odds with the claimed political neutrality of the games?
The content of the guide -- hosted by the US lobby GLAAD, which congratulates itself for "rewriting the script for LGBTQ acceptance" -- ranges from platitude to polemic & also manages to contradict itself. Is "gender identity" fixed & innate or does it change over time?