The United Kingdom has placed an indefinite ban on puberty blockers for minors.
“Existing emergency measures banning the sale and supply of puberty-suppressing hormones will be made indefinite, following official advice from medical experts,” the Department of Health and Social Care announced in a press release.
Health and Social Care Secretary Wes Streeting said in a statement, “Children’s healthcare must always be evidence-led. The independent expert Commission on Human Medicines found that the current prescribing and care pathway for gender dysphoria and incongruence presents an unacceptable safety risk for children and young people.”
He drew from the April review by Dr. Hillary Cass that found “gender care” for minors and young adults to be an “area of remarkably weak evidence, and yet results of studies are exaggerated or misrepresented by people on all sides of the debate to support their viewpoint,” the report said.
“We are working with NHS England to open new gender identity services, so people can access holistic health and wellbeing support they need. We are setting up a clinical trial into the use of puberty blockers next year, to establish a clear evidence base for the use of this medicine,” Streeting added.
Cass said she supports the indefinite ban: “I support the government’s decision to continue restrictions on the dispensing of puberty blockers for gender dysphoria outside the NHS where these essential safeguards are not being provided.”
Following the Cass Review, England’s National Health Service (NHS) announced that it was ending its distribution of routine prescription puberty blockers to minors.
“NHS England has carefully considered the evidence review conducted by NICE (2020) and has identified and reviewed any further published evidence available to date,” a report stated. “We have concluded that there is not enough evidence to support the safety or clinical effectiveness of PSH to make the treatment routinely available at this time.”
The U.K. then prohibited private clinics from prescribing puberty blockers to minors from June 3 through September 3.
