One good thing about saying I am a meanderer, is that no one should be surprised when I have to backtrack. Today is one of those days where I have to backtrack to some extent. Just after I posted my last epistle on the gender wars I read an article in the New York Times that causes me to reconsider some of the things I said.
This article by Megan Twohey and Christina Jewett alerted me to some very recent science that changes things. This article suggests that although puberty blockers can ease the anguish to transgender youths and buy some time for them to weigh their options open, now there are some growing concerns about the long-term physical effects and other consequences of such treatment. This makes the decisions transgender youth and their parents or guardians must make even more difficult. The Times reporters pointed out, “concerns are growing among some medical professionals about the consequences of the drugs.” In fact, they said a “small number of doctors won’t recommend them at all.” Evidence is emerging of potential harm from using blockers, particularly to the bones of growing youth who are taking such drugs. The estrogen and testosterone treatment affect the bones and other parts of the body, including brain. There is also some evidence that the children won’t recover from the losses when they go off blockers as much as earlier believed. As with so many treatments there is often a price to pay for using them and caution is clearly warranted.
As the reporters reminded,
“Many young patients and their families have concluded that the benefits of easing the despair of gender dysphoria far outweigh the risks of taking blockers. For others, the limited studies and politicization of trans medicine can make it difficult to fully evaluate the decision.”.
People have to make a judgment call in weighing the risks and the benefits. This is particularly important in the case of young children who don’t want to make irreparable mistakes. In Europe people seem to be better at basing their decisions on issues involving sexuality and gender on science than they are in the United States where unfortunately the decisions are often clouded by political considerations or ideology. As the Times reporters said, “…in the United States the public discourse about transgender care is growing more incendiary.” Or as Dr. Natalie Nokoff, assistant professor of pediatric endocrinology at the University of Colorado, put it we need “less vitriol, more science.”
Obviously I can’t give medical advice. It is the politics of the issue that concerns me and how young children in some cases become fodder in the gender wars.
Clearly, more research is needed. I think all scientists can agree on that. Issues like this need more light, not more heat.