Mick Hartley

The puberty blocker trial is the one big mis-step from the otherwise excellent Cass Review. You can perhaps see why she – Baroness Cass – thought it would be a good idea, providing some clarity in an otherwise murky area where there are more anecdotes than facts.

It would no doubt be helpful to have more information on the effect of these drugs on young “gender dysphoric” children, but this is an appalling way to go about it. Giving a drug that we know very well has powerful effects on a child’s development fails every moral test. It’s treating vulnerable children as guinea pigs. And we have thousands of children who went through this at the Tavistock Clinic, where no one bothered with follow-up data. This could surely be pursued.

MP Rebecca Paul has been pursuing this with the government. Here’s her latest letter.

A key point at no. 6: is there any precedent in the UK for paediatric clinical trials with the same level of risk of long-term harm?

The whole business stinks. It’s not medicine – more like a sop to the trans lobby, who like to complain about the lack of “affirming care” for trans children, when of course trans children are a social-media driven affectation, largely affecting gay children struggling with their puberty. It needs to be stopped.