Puberty Blockers – a Blight on the Brain
Puberty Suppression: Medicine or Malpractice
This report was prepared by Lesbians United, a grassroots lesbian-only organization based in the U.S. Lesbians United’s members work on a volunteer basis and have no financial conflicts of interest to declare.
Statement of Purpose In recent years, it has become standard practice for doctors in the United States and other countries to prescribe puberty-blocking drugs to adolescents who express dissatisfaction with their bodies or social roles. These drugs are often referred to as a “pause button,” a reversible intervention that gives adolescents time to explore, allows families to consider options for future medical intervention, and prevents the worsening of mental illness. However, a substantial body of research suggests that puberty-blocking drugs carry a significant risk of harmful and potentially irreversible effects.
The purpose of this document is to collect the highest-quality studies on puberty-blocking drugs and present their findings. This document’s primary research questions are:
- What are the effects of puberty-blocking drugs on the developing body?
- What are the effects of puberty-blocking drugs on mental health?
- To what degree, if any, are these effects reversible?
A meticulous, comprehensive overview
Everyone who would like to come to grips with the subject of puberty blockers and youth “transition” should read this paper. A meticulous, comprehensive overview of the issues involved.
Gender questioning children and family law: an evolving landscape.
Paper for the Australian Family Law profession. May 2023
https://drive.google.com/file/d/16bpYyK8-jycJrGBYwvyCaymOqnqVcQY1/view
Blockers and the brain
Kids’ hospital gender clinic tells families the effect of puberty blockers on the brain is unknown https://genderclinicnews.substack.com/p/blockers-and-the-brain
New studies prove puberty blockers are not reversible
Kirralie Smith November 15, 2022
Puberty blockers and their appalling side-effects are at last getting some attention.
Australian gender clinics like the one at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne claim that the use of puberty blockers are safe and reversible. Studies are now proving that not to be the case.
Sweden, Finland and the UK have stopped prescribing the drugs to children while their safety and effectiveness are being determined.
https://www.binary.org.au/new_studies_prove_puberty_blockers_are_not_reversible
Excellent and well-researched article in the NYTimes 1/14/2022
They Paused Puberty, but Is There a Cost?
https://archive.ph/xZXyG
In July 2022, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration added a warning to gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) agonists, commonly known as “puberty blockers,” indicating there were serious risks for youth who take them.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) identified six cases in females between the ages of 5 and 12, who were taking GnRH agonists, which presented “a plausible association between GnRH agonist use and pseudotumor cerebri.”
Some basic resources on puberty and puberty blockers courtesy of LGBAlliance (UK) @ALLIANCELGB
Dr.Az Hakeem on Puberty Blockers
More and more countries are realizing the evidence base for ‘puberty blockers’ is shallow, contradictory, and full of important gaps. They don’t even seem to alleviate the gender dysphoria that’s used as a justification for their use.
Puberty Blockers? Gay Teens Aren’t Sick!
And if you are serious about gender dysphoria and children and about the value of puberty blockers then you will read this:
The Dutch Protocol for Juvenile Transsexuals: Origins and Evidence
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0092623X.2022.2121238
Interview with medical psychotherapist Dr. Az Hakeem and University of Oxford sociologist Michael Biggs about their writings and research critical of the medical transitioning of children. The two spoke at the LGB Alliance conference in London October 2022. The LGB Alliance says that lesbian, gay and bisexual people have been overlooked and harmed by trans ideology
There are studies of puberty blockers for central precocious puberty dating back to the 80s but the SciAm article specifically referred to treatment of gender dysphoria, which is a different condition and raises different issues.https://t.co/qknoam2azx
— justdad7 (@justdad7) May 3, 2023
The Only Way Out of the Child-Gender Culture War
The U.S. is becoming an outlier. Punitive bans won’t help. Better evidence will.
By Helen Lewis
‘Across the world, doctors are expressing caution over side effects, acknowledging the experimental nature of medical interventions, and entertaining the possibility that the recent surge in teenage trans identification is socially driven rather than solely evidence of previous underdiagnosis. That has put much of Europe on a different path from the United States….
…the American medical system cannot be trusted to moderate itself. “Are these bans the perfect solution? Probably not,” he told me. “But at the end of the day, if it’s between banning gender-affirming care and leaving it unregulated, I think we can minimize the amount of harm by banning it.” Corinna Cohn, a Gender Care Consumer Advocacy Network board member who herself transitioned as a teenager, has also testified in favor of similar legislation. “In a perfect world, the policies would be more nuanced than full bans,” she told me via email. “In practice, there are only two possibilities: a total lack of accountability (status quo), or a ban on the practice entirely.”….
A proper systematic review of child-transition care by the American medical establishment might well uncover the same blurry picture now agreed upon by doctors in England, France, Norway, Sweden, and Finland. Clinical guidelines would have to change as a result, stressing the importance of assessment and therapy, and clinics would have to get better at collecting long-term follow-up data. In the meantime, the United States should take after Europe. Requiring medical assessment and counseling before prescribing puberty blockers or hormones to minors would be neither illiberal nor punitive, and insisting that patient outcomes be tracked over several years will give us better data on what works.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/texas-puberty-blockers-gender-care-transgender-rights/673941/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share