UK grants indefinite puberty blockers for gender-dysphoric children over ‘safety risks’ | World News

The British government on Wednesday indefinitely banned puberty blockers for children with gender dysphoria after independent experts found there was an unacceptable safety risk in prescribing the drug.

The decision, which will be reviewed in 2027, effectively bans a common approach to medical gender transitions for young people. It also flies in the face of standards supported by medical groups elsewhere, including the European and World Professional Association for Transgender Health, as well as the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics.

The ban will prevent the prescription of drugs that can suppress or interrupt puberty in children with gender dysphoria, giving more time to consider options that could include sex reassignment.

The announcement comes after a judge this summer upheld an emergency ban in a ruling that said the treatment was potentially harmful. The emergency ban was put in place by the centre-right Conservative government and has now been extended by the centre-left Labor government.

The ban does not apply to those already receiving puberty blockers for gender dysphoria, their use in clinical trials or to treat children with precocious puberty, an unusual medical condition that causes puberty to start abnormally early.

It applies in the United Kingdom after consultation with the Scottish and Welsh governments and an agreement with Northern Ireland.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting said a clinical trial would be set up next year to better assess the use of the drugs.

“We need to proceed with caution and care when it comes to this vulnerable group of young people and follow the advice of experts,” Streeting said.

England’s National Health Service stopped prescribing puberty-blocking drugs at gender identity clinics last year, saying there was insufficient evidence of benefits and harms.

In July, Judge Beverley Lang said a review commissioned by the NHS found “very substantial risks and very narrow benefits” for the treatment. She concluded that gendered care was an area of ​​”remarkably weak evidence” and that young people were caught up in a “stormy social discourse”.

The British Medical Association, which noted that the NHS review was controversial and included patients, academics, scientists and legal experts among its critics, voted to carry out an evidence-based assessment of that report.

The court challenge was brought by the TransActual group and a young man who cannot be named, according to a court ruling.

TransActual criticized Wednesday’s decision, saying evidence of danger from 40 years of puberty blockers remains elusive.

“Banning drugs without evidence of serious harm, only to trans people … is plain discrimination,” said Keyne Walker, the group’s director of strategy. “Evidence of the harm caused by the temporary ban continues to emerge and will only increase now that it has become permanent.”