UK judge upholds ban on puberty blockers for gender dysphoria for children

A High Court judge in the United Kingdom on Monday upheld the government’s emergency ban on puberty blockers for the treatment of gender dysphoria in children and adolescents.

The ruling comes following the implementation of a permanent ban on puberty blockers from the National Health Service this spring, instituted by the Conservative Party leadership under former Health Secretary Victoria Atkins.

The ruling largely relied upon the evaluation of the extant evidence on the safety and efficacy of puberty blockers for youth gender dysphoria conducted by former President of the Royal College of Pediatrics Hilary Cass.

The so-called Cass Report found that the support for puberty blockers consisted of “small, uncontrolled observational studies, which are subject to bias and confounding, and all the results are of very low certainty.”

High Court Judge Beverley Lang concluded that the current protocols are supported by “remarkably weak evidence.”

The new Labour health secretary, Wes Streeting, responded to the ruling by saying that “children’s healthcare must be evidence-led.”

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“I am working with NHS England to improve children’s gender identity services and setting up a clinical trial to establish the evidence on puberty blockers,” Streeting said.

Under the ban, puberty blockers remain available for other medical conditions, such as early-onset puberty.