The US Department of Health and Human Services 400 pages of report Instead of rejecting minors’ gender-affirming care and recommending “exploratory psychotherapy” instead, it is recommended as a preferred method for treating transgender youth who suffer from gender discomfort.
Critics say “exploratory psychotherapy” is a conversion therapy under a different name.
This report was prepared by an unnamed author to prohibit gender maintenance care for people under the age of 19 and to use federal funds to cover the costs of such procedures.
It argues there is a lack of evidence to support medical interventions such as adolescent blockers, hormonal therapy, and surgery, and warns about the potential health consequences of pursuing such treatments.
The report positively points out that it will not serve as clinical guidance and will not develop policy recommendations.
We also note that limitations, focusing solely on the effects of gender-affirming treatments on minors rather than adults. However, he summarises and claims that he has been critically evaluated.[d]” Existing literature on “best practices” for treating young people with gender discomfort.
an HHS Statement Physicians, medical ethicists and methodologists contributed to the report, but refused to name the parties involved “to maintain the integrity of this process.”
“Our duty is to protect the children of our country — not to expose them to unproven irreversible medical interventions,” Dr. Jay Bhatacharya, director of the National Institute of Health, said in a statement. “We must follow the gold standard of science, not the activist agenda.”
The HHS Report also attacked the World Professional Association for Transgender Health and several major American Medical Associations for statements in favor of gender-affirming care, accusing those organizations of “generating perceptions of professional consensus that do not exist,” suppressing the opinions and opinions of enemies of gender violation care.
This report cites the CASS review. This concludes that there is a lack of evidence to support the use of medical interventions to treat gender discomfort using medical interventions such as adolescent blockers and hormone therapy.
Its landmark report has led the UK National Health Service to suspend prescribing such treatments for adolescents, except for rare clinical trials. Experts expressed concern about the methodology of the CASS report and criticised the omission of other studies aimed at showing the benefits of hormonal interventions.
Critics of the HSS Report present a robust and biased view of gender-affirming care, claiming it is a more political document than a scientific one.
Dr. Susan Cresley, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said the report “misconducts current medical consensus and does not reflect the reality of pediatric care.”
Other critics criticize the HHS report for arguing that pursuing gender-maintaining care is a “child-driven” process in which mental health assessments are “often minimized or omitted.” Rather, some practitioners say that most doctors are cautious and take a conservative and intentional approach to treating young people with gender discomfort before starting them on the path to hormonal or surgical intervention.
Critics also have problems with the HHS report that “many” trans young people are receiving gender-affirming care. Recently published five years of research It was found that less than 0.1% of commercial insurance adolescents in the US received either adolescent blockers or hormones.
a Individual research Looking at the frequency of gender-maintaining surgeries, we found that less than 1,200 young people had sex-maintaining surgery in one year before the Covid-19 pandemic.
The HHS report recommends that treatments used to support minors and gender transitions, as well as “social transitions” where medical procedures are not being performed, compared to 2022 guidance from the Florida Department of Health.
That guidance was then used as the basis for both the law and Department of Health regulations aimed at limiting access to hormonal and surgical interventions and taxpayer funding.
“It’s very cold to see the federal government inject politics and ideology into medical science,” says Shannon Minter, legal director at the National Center for Lesbian Rights. He told the Associated Pressthe report suggests that physicians are intended to threaten transgender minors and families to pursue gender-affirming interventions.
“It’s Orwell. It’s designed to be confused and confusing.”
Casey Pick, director of law and policy at Trevor Project, the country’s top suicide prevention and crisis intervention organization for LGBTQ adolescents, condemned the HHS report’s recommendations on “exploratory psychotherapy” for transgender youth.
In particular, the authors of the report argue that exploratory psychotherapy is not in the way as they argue that conversion therapy is not the same, and that therapists engaged in practice are simply “trying to help children and adolescents agree with their bodies.”
“Discomfort with sexual body and social-based expectations is common during adolescence and adolescence. For this and other reasons, an approach focused on reducing minors’ pain to the body or social role is a problematic and potentially harmful rhetorical device,” the report reads.
Pick says practitioners often come to their patients with their biases and intentions, with the given outcome in mind. That is, it persuades uncomfortable young people to adhere to gender norms based on their gender at birth.
“This report goes a step further by not only rejecting best healthcare practices for transgender people, but by recommending conversion therapy rather than new brand names,” Pick said. USA TODAY. “Despite the claims in the report, this is actually the same harmful practice of conversion therapy, not only using a more accessible language.”
Source: Metro Weekly – www.metroweekly.com
