Maiming a generation: The medicalisation of gender non-conforming young people is the biggest medical scandal of our time

We’re in the middle of another medical disaster that rivals — some would say dwarfs — the Thalidomide affair. But unlike previous scandals, the medicalisation of gender non-conforming (GNC) young people has continued for years after clinicians first raised concerns. Disturbingly, these whistleblowers have been maligned by the pro-transition lobby and, worse, by fellow clinicians for speaking up.

One of those was Sonia Appleby, children’s safeguarding lead for the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust which runs the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS), the UK’s only gender clinic for under-16s. Sonia was approached by several members of staff in 2016 and 2017 who expressed alarm that many young people waiting for assessment by GIDS were being provided with puberty-blocking drugs by a private GP.

Appleby raised numerous concerns in private; these ranged from the rogue GP to the lack of adequate record keeping at GIDS, to overworked staff and other serious safeguarding issues. Nor was hers a lone voice: in February 2019 GIDS governor Marcus Evans resigned, warning that the service had an “overvalued belief in [its own expertise] which is used to dismiss challenge and examination”.

A couple of months later five further clinicians resigned, saying they felt treatment amounted to “conversion therapy” for young lesbian and gay people. They told of homophobic parents bringing in their GNC children to “correct” their aberrant behaviour. “There was dark joke among staff that there would be no gay people left,” two of them told The Times. These concerns were reported by Newsnight last year:

There have been many times when the push to transition has come from families who are uncomfortable with the sexual orientation of their child [Newsnight reported]…some parents express real relief that their child is not gay or lesbian, suggesting being trans is a better outcome for their child.

More whistleblowers told their stories to the distinguished psychiatrist David Bell, who in 2018 wrote a report that wasn’t just ignored by GIDS: for unspecified legal reasons, the trust’s chief executive and chairman of the board both forbade him to send it to the council of governors; he was also told not to write or talk in public about anything “not directly connected to his NHS employment”.