🚨NEW DOCUMENTS in the Alabama lawsuit over sex "change" age restrictions.
Some very interesting facts now coming to light. 🧵
1/ @wpath sought but did not receive the American Academy of Pediatrics’ (@ameracadpeds) endorsement for its eighth “Standards of Care” (SOC8).
In private emails to WPATH a colleague, SOC-8 lead author Eli Coleman said that this was “highly confidential.”
2/ Coleman appears to admit that it is misleading to claim that medical groups writing amicus briefs against age restriction laws means these groups endorse SOC-8. WPATH tried but failed to get endorsements. (Exhibit #190)
3/ Coleman had “hope[d]” that the “Amer Plastic Surgery organization” (i.e., the American Society of Plastic Surgeons) would endorse SOC8 and said that efforts to that effect were “underway.”
4/ Disturbingly, Coleman complains about “a network of parents who have been concerned about the lack of careful evaluations, lack of involvement in decision making, and perceptions of rushed decisions which they feel account for the increased number of regret cases especially among youth.”
His solution? Not to address those concerns, but to “amplify the[] voices” of parents who transitioned their kids and are content with their decision.
5/ Despite gender clinicians like @YaleMedicine Meredithe McNamara and @jack_turban claiming that WPATH’s approach is aligned with the recommendations of the Cass Review (see, e.g., Yale Integrity Project white paper and related amicus brief in Skrmetti), Coleman admits that the U.K., Sweden, Finland, etc. are implementing policies that are “more and more out of step with WPATH SOC8.”
6/ On the critical question of conflicts of interest in SOC8's development, Coleman admits that he knew “at least most participants in the SOC-8 process had financial and/or nonfinancial conflicts of interest” when the guidelines were being developed. (Doc. 557-21, deposition of Coleman)
7/ WPATH president Marci Bowers (@Bowers_MD) said it was “absolutely” “important for someone to be an advocate for [gender transition] treatments” in order to be on the SOC8 development team.
A more smoking gun example of conflict of interest is hard to imagine.
8/ Bowers, who famously performed Jazz Jennings' vaginoplasty, made over one million dollars in net income performing gender transition surgeries in the past year, according to Bowers' deposition.
There are other interesting findings, but that's it for now.
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BREAKING: The New York Times (@nytimes) has just called out the Chair of the Board of the American Medical Association (@AmerMedicalAssn), Dr. David Aizuss (@lasereyedoc), for misrepresenting his organization's recent media statements on pediatric gender medicine.
Here's what happened🧵
On February 3, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (@ASPS_News) published its policy statement acknowledging the low quality of evidence for hormones and surgeries in <19 and recommending that surgeries be deferred to age 19+.
The following day, the American Medical Association told National Review (@NRO) and the New York Times (@nytimes) that it agreed with ASPS on surgeries.
Here is what the AMA's communications officer, Joshua Zembik, told the NYT:
Two articles came out today on pediatric gender medicine and its current political context.
Both are worth reading🧵
In @TheAtlantic, @benappel writes about the difficulties growing up as an effeminate boy. He would later discover that so-called "progressives" were now nudging effeminate boys to interpret their feelings of difference as evidence that they are really girls.
Appel calls for an honest conversation among liberals of how a regressive outlook, now fueling a medical practice, has managed to pass itself off as progressive. And he calls for greater tolerance for gender nonconformity in boys from liberals and conservatives.
NEW: “I’ve been covering this controversy for about a decade from a left-of-center perspective, and I’ve found that anyone who questions these treatments, even mildly, is invariably accused of bigotry.”
🧵on @jessesingal’s important new piece in the New York Times this morning.
For years, LGBT organizations insisted that the science of youth gender medicine was settled, citing an apparent consensus of medical associations.
Now that the American Society of Plastic Surgeons has backed away from gender surgeries in <19, with the American Medical Association endorsing the move, there is no longer a consensus. The ASPS also acknowledged the lack of supportive evidence for hormones.
🚨A group of 106 members of Congress wrote a letter to Secretary of HHS RJK, Jr., criticizing the Department's efforts to roll back what they call "medically necessary, evidence-based care" in the form of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones (but not surgeries). 🧵
With surgeries unmentioned, the authors say that endocrine interventions are supported by "every major medical and mental health association in the U.S."
Astoundingly, they claim that "numerous studies and systematic reviews... have confirmed the safety, efficacy, and benefits" of these interventions.
Their only citation is the Utah report, which is not a systematic review.
🚨While attention has been focused on medical groups backing off from gender surgeries in minors and a $2M detransitioner lawsuit, an important exchange has taken place in Stat News Opinion First between authors and critics of the HHS report on pediatric gender dysphoria.
👇
Last week, a group of self-described “pediatric bioethicists” and advocates for pediatric medical transition (PMT), including Yale Medicine’s Meredithe McNamara, criticized the HHS report, writing that “analysis of its poor ethical reasoning remains urgently needed.”
Today, a group of HHS report authors responded, explaining why the report’s reasoning is consistent with widely accepted principles of medical ethics and pointing to serious flaws in the McNamara group’s article.