Mick Hartley

This is all very depressing. From the Times:

A child under the age of five is among thousands on NHS waiting lists for gender clinics, new figures show.

More than 5,700 under-18s are waiting for a specialist appointment at two clinics set up to help children wanting to change gender. The youngest patient is under five years old, according to the NHS England data provided under the Freedom of Information Act.

Children can be referred to one of the specialist clinics by their GP if they are in severe distress due to a mismatch between their biological sex and their gender. Previously, the only NHS clinic providing gender services for children was at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust.

In April the clinic was closed down and replaced by two new services, at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London and Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool. These were designed to offer more “holistic” care to children struggling with their gender identity, bringing together existing mental health, hormone and autism services.

The clinic was shut after a review by Dr Hilary Cass raised concerns that it was providing unsafe care, including giving children puberty blockers and rushing them into medical transition….

Dr Roman Raczka, president of the British Psychological Society, said: “These latest figures make for concerning reading. It is imperative that children and young people have timely access to the professional care and support they need.

“We must remember that behind the numbers, headlines and often toxic public discourse, there are children and young people who need to access care. All too often the issue of gender care which has played out in public has been damaging to the children, young people and families desperately seeking help and must change.”

Ashley Grossman, an endocrinologist who has been practising for more than 40 years and who has treated adult transgender patients, described the figures as “deeply depressing” although they “probably reflect the huge disparity in general between the requirements for mental health services for children and the resources available”.

The emeritus professor of endocrinology at the University of Oxford added: “There seems to have been a large rise in demand for these services, especially since the isolation and loss of schooling during the pandemic, so I suspect this is a wider problem than for children with gender dysphoria alone.”

It's unfortunate that the experts quoted feel unable to state the obvious truth: that children are unable to change gender, and it's unconscionably cruel to let them believe such a dangerous lie. The surge in numbers is a result of social contagion and – certainly in the case of the under-five child, and likely in many others – pushy irresponsible parents. The best thing that can happen to these children is to be left alone to go through puberty, when in the vast majority of cases the problems will resolve themselves – gay, most likely – without them havng to suffer life-changing (life-ruining) medical interventions.

No children are "born in the wrong body". No children are trans.