Wes Streeting's strictures; French trans activist triumph; Dr Olson-Kennedy sued for negligence; Kiwi ministers were warned; still waiting for Oz data; clinical trials and tribulations in the UK
What is going on with the ethics Committees 0f these hospitals. I have done a lot of clinical studies in my time. One of the main prerequisites is that the primary and secondary outcomes must be specified prior to commencing the study. and the statistical tests that will be used.
It appears from Dr Pangs comment that this rule doesn't apply in Gender studies. They can change the primary and secondary outcomes at will.
As Physician I am ashamed that the RACP gave tacit approval to this treatment in 2019 but even more ashamed that they have not changed their support despite more and more reviews documenting a lack of efficacy and increasing evidence of harm. That anyone could think that giving puberty blockers which almost inevitably lead on to irreversible cross sex hormones and then to radical surgery is a good idea is beyond me. And to do that to children who have no idea what they are getting into is a scandal.
I believe they outsourced the decision making to a subcommittee of interested members which just happens to be made up of those members involved in the Gender Clinic and surprise, surprise, the Affirmative Model got a big tick. Who needs evidence.
In August 2019 the then Minister of Health Greg Hunt wrote to the Royal Australian College of Physicians (RACP) seeking advice on the existing treatment of gender dysphoria (GD) in children.
The response was essentially that ‘the RACP strongly supports expert clinical care that is non-judgemental, supportive and welcoming for children’. The response goes further to mention ‘the vulnerability of children with GD and references the high rates of self-harm and suicide’.
Further, the College advised that holding a national inquiry would not increase the scientific evidence available regarding GD but would further harm vulnerable patients and their families through increased media and public attention.
Surprisingly there was no reference to the fact that the affirmative model of ‘gender care’ had not undergone any formal clinical trial and was not evidence base. Nor did it mention that multiple studies indicated the heavy burden of mental health co-morbidities in the GD cohort explain, in large part, the vulnerability of the children with GD and that long-term studies of outcomes following ‘transition’ indicate high mental health co-morbidities and rates of suicide.
One would expect that our preeminent medical college would provide a critical analysis of the ‘safety and efficacy’ of an intervention that provides off-label hormones to children who undergo extensive mutilating, sterilising surgical procedures. Instead the college stated it “strongly supports expert clinical care that is non-judgemental, supportive and welcoming for children”.
And it was revealed recently that the RACP had failed to pass on to Hunt the strongly expressed concerns of endocrinologists consulted as part of the review.
That 2019 response from the RACP only gave a couple of options for those trying to understand such a position. Either those who have sought and obtained leadership positions which qualify them to be speaking on behalf of medical science ( as opposed to social science) have either undertaken some sort of parallel medical training, or there are darker , overtly “politically correct “ reasons , in supporting gender identity ideology, which doesn’t bear contemplation , for it to come from an ostensibly impeccable scientific source. We are indeed in trouble
The purely ideological basis for the support of so-called "affirming care" is being made clearer by the day. Confused and vulnerable children are essentially being made sacrificial victims to an irrational ideology -- or really theology -- of a gender soul which somehow exists before conception and is, according to trans activists, the true essence of the individual. This is madness.
Thank you, Bernard, for your continuing and excellent coverage and reporting.
Your voice is so valuable in this confusing and overwhelming, mind-boggling
worldwide debacle.
Love, Indio
What is going on with the ethics Committees 0f these hospitals. I have done a lot of clinical studies in my time. One of the main prerequisites is that the primary and secondary outcomes must be specified prior to commencing the study. and the statistical tests that will be used.
It appears from Dr Pangs comment that this rule doesn't apply in Gender studies. They can change the primary and secondary outcomes at will.
Your updates are incredibly helpful, thank you so much!
As Physician I am ashamed that the RACP gave tacit approval to this treatment in 2019 but even more ashamed that they have not changed their support despite more and more reviews documenting a lack of efficacy and increasing evidence of harm. That anyone could think that giving puberty blockers which almost inevitably lead on to irreversible cross sex hormones and then to radical surgery is a good idea is beyond me. And to do that to children who have no idea what they are getting into is a scandal.
I believe they outsourced the decision making to a subcommittee of interested members which just happens to be made up of those members involved in the Gender Clinic and surprise, surprise, the Affirmative Model got a big tick. Who needs evidence.
I wonder if they will feel pressure to revisit the issue.
They make it remarkably difficult for the rank and file to express an opinion.
In August 2019 the then Minister of Health Greg Hunt wrote to the Royal Australian College of Physicians (RACP) seeking advice on the existing treatment of gender dysphoria (GD) in children.
The response was essentially that ‘the RACP strongly supports expert clinical care that is non-judgemental, supportive and welcoming for children’. The response goes further to mention ‘the vulnerability of children with GD and references the high rates of self-harm and suicide’.
Further, the College advised that holding a national inquiry would not increase the scientific evidence available regarding GD but would further harm vulnerable patients and their families through increased media and public attention.
Surprisingly there was no reference to the fact that the affirmative model of ‘gender care’ had not undergone any formal clinical trial and was not evidence base. Nor did it mention that multiple studies indicated the heavy burden of mental health co-morbidities in the GD cohort explain, in large part, the vulnerability of the children with GD and that long-term studies of outcomes following ‘transition’ indicate high mental health co-morbidities and rates of suicide.
One would expect that our preeminent medical college would provide a critical analysis of the ‘safety and efficacy’ of an intervention that provides off-label hormones to children who undergo extensive mutilating, sterilising surgical procedures. Instead the college stated it “strongly supports expert clinical care that is non-judgemental, supportive and welcoming for children”.
And it was revealed recently that the RACP had failed to pass on to Hunt the strongly expressed concerns of endocrinologists consulted as part of the review.
That 2019 response from the RACP only gave a couple of options for those trying to understand such a position. Either those who have sought and obtained leadership positions which qualify them to be speaking on behalf of medical science ( as opposed to social science) have either undertaken some sort of parallel medical training, or there are darker , overtly “politically correct “ reasons , in supporting gender identity ideology, which doesn’t bear contemplation , for it to come from an ostensibly impeccable scientific source. We are indeed in trouble
The purely ideological basis for the support of so-called "affirming care" is being made clearer by the day. Confused and vulnerable children are essentially being made sacrificial victims to an irrational ideology -- or really theology -- of a gender soul which somehow exists before conception and is, according to trans activists, the true essence of the individual. This is madness.