A British health service clinic is considering opening up access to a drug that blocks hormones to children at the start of puberty. It would be possible from the age of 9.
Stop puberty from 9 years old in children with gender dysphoria, that is to say who suffer from an opposition between felt gender and physical sex. According to information from Mail on Sunday, the British health service (NHS) has closed a clinical trial in children. He was evaluating a controversial drug that interrupts puberty in preparation for sex reassignment surgery.
Interrupt puberty
Gender dysphoria describes a disorder in which patients are “trapped in the wrong body,” reports the Mail on Sunday. In the United Kingdom, only one establishment associated with the NHS takes care of these disorders: the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust. It was in this clinic that the trial took place testing a drug of the Gonapeptyl type, which interrupts the development of puberty. A monthly belly injection suppresses the production of testosterone or estrogen. In young girls, the menstrual cycle and breast growth stop; in young men, facial hair growth and voice shedding stop. As part of the trial, young people aged 12 to 14 were followed, all for gender dysphoria.
The results of the 3-year clinical trial were conclusive, says the Mail on Sunday. Doctors at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust have therefore decided to make it available to patients with gender dysphoria. They also introduce a new notion: the stage of puberty will serve as a reference, and no longer the patient’s age. Indeed, they noted that, in young Europeans, puberty can occur as early as 9 years old. Management must therefore occur as soon as possible, in order to avoid psychological problems for the children.
Drastic selection criteria
However, there is no question of opening such treatment to all comers. Principal investigator, Dr Polly Carmichael, tells Mail on Sunday that the selection criteria will be very strict. The children must meet a specific profile: their bone density and weight must be normal, they must not suffer from any serious mental problem, and adopt the treatment with the consent of the parents. Moreover, to benefit from such care, it will be necessary for the child to have exhibited transgender behavior for at least 5 years.
In the eyes of opponents of a gender reassignment, the availability of the drug risks the rapid categorization of “tomboys” and doll-playing boys as transgender. Supporters of treatment see it as a necessary “window” to define gender without disruption for children with gender dysphoria. And proof that such a medication does not necessarily lead to an operation: only 8 children out of the 32 included in the study have decided to permanently change their sex.
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