A recent article in Pediatrics, the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), claims that laws protecting minors from hormone treatments and transition surgery “amounts to state-sanctioned medical neglect and emotional abuse.”
The article, written by Emily Georges, Emily C.B. Brown, and Rachel Silliman Cohen of the Seattle Children’s Hospital, claim they want to “refute the idea that gender-affirming care (GAC) [sic] is child maltreatment” and also “demonstrate how withholding GAC is harmful to children and amounts to state-sanctioned medical neglect and emotional abuse.”
“They deny children access to routine health care that has been shown to decrease dramatically high rates of suicide and depression for TGD youth,” the authors said.
Assistant professor at Baylor College of Medicine’s Department of Psychiatry Kathleen McDeavitt criticized the article, claiming that many statements the author’s made were false.
“The authors state that GAC ‘does not cause harm’ and ‘decreases many negative health outcomes, including rates of depression,’” McDeavitt said. “No relevant citations are provided for this claim. Although youth GAC has the support of the professional medical community in the United States,that does not mean there is no risk of harm.”
“Infertility, lack of development of genital tissue, problems with sexual functioning, psychosocial/cognitive delay, decrease in bone mineral density accrual, and the known side effect profiles of estrogen and testosterone (e.g., thrombotic events, cardiovascular disease, etc.) are all potential risks associated with the hormonal agents used in youth GAC,” she continud.
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