NHS bosses have been ordered to unveil the fate of 9,000 transgender young people treated at the Tavistock clinic after trusts refused to give information to the Cass review.
The Health Secretary has demanded “full co-operation” after the report found adult gender clinics had declined to disclose whether transgender people who started their treatment as children later changed their minds or suffered serious mental health problems.
Victoria Atkins, the Health Secretary says she has had enough of “a culture of secrecy and ideology over evidence and safety”.
On Wednesday, she met the chief executive of NHS England, Amanda Pritchard to tell her “nothing less than full co-operation by those clinics in the research is acceptable”.
“We simply do not know the lifelong impact of these medical interventions on young minds and bodies to be clear that they are safe,” she told The Telegraph.
The Cass Review, published on Wednesday by paediatrician Dr Hilary Cass, claims young people with gender dysphoria have been “let down” by the NHS, and has called for gender services for young people to “match the standards of other NHS care”.
The report recommended an end to giving powerful hormone drugs to under-18s and urged “extreme caution” when caring for under-25s.
Atkins says that she expects private clinics to also follow these recommendations, as she looks to the Department for Health and Social Care for a way of blocking doctors abroad from prescribing puberty blockers to children in Britain.
She praised those who spoke out to “raise the alarm about how treatment was diverging so far from guidance” before adding that she is “greatly troubled” by the rapid rise in the referral of teenage girls to transgender clinics.
Cass’ conclusions are documented in a 388-page report, making 32 recommendations on how gender services for children and young people should operate.
Addressing children and young people in the foreword to her report, she wrote: “I have been disappointed by the lack of evidence on the long-term impact of taking hormones from an early age; research has let us all down, most importantly you.
“The reality is we have no good evidence on the long-term outcomes of interventions to manage gender-related distress.”
Atkins added: “It is disgraceful that adult gender clinics have not co-operated with the vital University of York research to link data on children at the Tavistock so that we can understand their journey into adulthood.
“This Government took the unprecedented step of changing the law to make this possible. There can be no further delay on their full participation. I know that NHS England will use all the powers at their disposal to compel this if they have to.”
It is believed that health chiefs will use legal powers to order the main seven adult gender clinics to give data they hold on trans patients.
https://www.gbnews.com/news/tavistock-clinic-cass-review-transgender-patients