While the U.S. Supreme Court is deciding whether to uphold state bans on the use of puberty blockers as well as hormone treatment for minors who think they might be transgender, the Washington Post is hyping both procedures, especially puberty blockers.
This hype was provided by Casey Parks whose job description describes her as a "Social issues reporter covering gender and family." Or you can enjoy her leftist-celebrated book about her "queer lineage."
The Parks pitch for puberty blockers appeared in the Post on Tuesday, "Puberty blockers, hormones: What to know about gender care for minors."
That sounds like a fact sheet. But the biggest problem with the Parks pitch disguised as a newspaper story is how it absurdly overlooks the many, many medical concerns about using puberty blockers and hormone treatments. Oh, Parks does toss in this rather insignificant reservation, then goes on to ignore the major reservations presented by medical experts:
Critics of transition care have noted that using these drugs to treat gender dysphoria is an “off label” use, meaning that the medications were approved by the Food and Drug Administration for another purpose. But researchers have noted that many drugs are used “off label” for pediatric patients, because medications are often only tested on adults while being developed.
Yeah, the objection to puberty blockers is just a dispute over "off label" use which now allows Parks to skip the much larger medical objections provided by experts.
Parks also brushes off the effect of puberty blockers on bone density by citing an associate professor of medicine Carl Streed who turns out not to be very reassuring at all:
Using puberty blockers can reduce a patient’s bone mineral density, but Streed said research shows many patients do catch up, bone density wise, once they either resume puberty or start hormones. That’s not always the case, though, and doctors are continuing to study the drug’s effects, Streed said.
“That’s something we’re still further characterizing, but this isn’t leading to people having brittle bones or bones that are breaking easily and so forth,” Streed said. “This is just us measuring what people’s bone density is and seeing that there’s a difference. I wouldn’t say it’s irreversible. I would say that’s just the known effect of the medications.”
So Streed says it can reduce bone mineral density in a patient and he can't say for sure if its irreversible but, hey, shouldn't we all just roll the dice and gamble with our health that those promoting puberty blockers are right?
In addition to causing a reduction in bone density there is also the problem of sterility. Parks provides this not very reassuring "assurance."
Not in most cases. A patient’s outcomes will vary based on when they start puberty blockers, whether they take cross-sex hormones and how long they remain on the medication.
And concludes with this rather frightening gem:
Surgeries to remove a patient’s ovaries or testes do make a trans person infertile, though doctors encourage those patients to freeze their eggs or sperm first.
Ouch!
The overall problem with Parks' story is that it is the result of incredible misinformation due to not citing the many medical experts around the world who not only have deep reservations about the use of puberty blockers but are now actively warning against its use. It takes mental blockers to avoid seeing the many dangers of puberty blockers since a quick search on the web easily reveals this information such as the Google search for "puberty blockers Europe" which yields these easy to find results:
England
The National Health Service (NHS) stopped prescribing puberty blockers to children at gender identity clinics in March 2024. The decision was based on a lack of evidence that the drugs are safe and effective. Puberty blockers are now only available for children under 18 who are already taking them, or in clinical trials.Scotland
In April 2024, Scotland's only gender clinic stopped prescribing puberty blockers to people under 18. The clinic also stopped prescribing other hormone treatments to new minor patients.Sweden
In 2021, the Karolinska University Hospital stopped prescribing hormones to minors. The hospital cited a lack of evidence on the long-term consequences of the treatments. The National Board of Health and Welfare updated its guidelines to state that puberty blockers should only be used in exceptional cases.
And in America's next door neighbor, Canada, a pioneer in the use of puberty blockers now regrets her role in it:
Doctors in Canada have been prescribing puberty blockers to children with gender identity disorders since the early 2000s. Child psychiatrist Dr. Susan Bradley, now 82 and the founder of a controversial former gender identity clinic at Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, said she regrets using the drugs.
“I kept asking myself, ‘Is it possible that we are actually colluding rather than taking the pressure off and giving (children) a chance to think everything out,” Bradley said. “And it turns out that I think we were colluding, not consciously, but subconsciously,” said Bradley, a professor emeritus of psychiatry at the University of Toronto.
So rather than being just a reporter, Casey Parks is an advocate for highly questionable medical procedures in the name of promoting the trans ideology. An advocacy that is so extreme as to cause her to completely ignore medical advice that does not adhere to her dangerous doctrines.
