Tavistock Gender Clinic to close - it failed vulnerable under-18s

Galaxy

They were failed in every aspect of their care that's why its being closed.

All of them?

I agree with you Dickens. Gender isn't quite so straightforward as some people seem to think. I've taught young people with gender dysphoria and life is tough for them. They don't feel they belong, they're confused and they get bullied. It exists. As I mentioned before, I know two boys who successfully transitioned and are now leading happy lives.

Gender isn't just about one chromosome of our DNA. It's about hormones and possibly brain structure too. Humans don't all produce the same amount of hormones in the same combination. There are literally thousands of combinations along a continuum. If one identical twin has gender dysphoria, it's more likely that the other twin has it too, so it's probable that there is some kind of genetic element. It would appear that the role of the Y chromosome is evolving and diminishing too, so who's to say that those with gender dysphoria aren't ahead of their time from an evolutionary perspective?

It appears that the Tavistock Clinic was failing its clients through inadequate counselling. I hope it's not used as an excuse in an attack on gender transitioning.

I don't understand why it's become such a hot political issue for some people.

Yes I think some of the medical professionals who were involved in private companies are currently being investigated.

Chewbacca

^I think a few things (as have been discussed to death on other threads) but the one being discussed here is the obsession of those with maintaining gender norms.^

Well thank God that Hilary Cass can see the same problem as the obsession that posters on here have. Does it not concern you, even just a little bit, that hundreds of children have been psychologically, physically and medically experimented on at the gids clinic @ Tavistock? That they, and the whistleblowers, are saying that they weren't trans; they were having other issues such as autism, homosexuality, bisexual, mental health issues, but we're railroaded down the trans tunnel regardless. Don't you have any empathy for them and feel some sense of relief that they'll now stand a chance of being listened to properly?

I don't think children who are waiting 4 years for a first appointment can in anyway said to be "railroaded". They are in fact being sadly failed by the NHS who (whatever their issues) are not providing a timely response to the problem.
Of course if you have the money there are a number of private gender clinics who can supply treatment,.
And of course there are always drugs available on the internet for any under 18 to access.
People (and that includes children )who are desperate will do all sorts of risky things

They were failed in every aspect of their care that's why its being closed.

It is the TG 'activists' - those that disrupt women's groups and activities, and are often verbally aggressive and threatening, who are the problem. They might be a minority, but the sensational media reporting on them just stirs up antagonism towards the whole TG community, making life very difficult for those, like my friend, who just want to get on with their lives like everyone else.

I couldn't agree more, Dickens and have said this over and over again for years now, but still we get the same drivel about not caring about other issues, about being obsessed and so on, and posts can feel like a game of I went To Market at times. People are waiting with 'Gotcha's if you accidentally miss out a point, but are also poised to pounce if you say something you've said before because it's 'boring'. It's tiring.

That is not directed at you, btw - it's just that it seems to be happening more and more that you answer a question as it is put, and then get grief for not bringing in something else. Things do seem to be more tetchy than usual on GN just now though - I think I need to post elsewhere for a while.

This may be a real problem, in a few years, if one or more of these young people wish to become parents.

Their bodies may have been permanently damaged in all sorts of ways.?

I think a few things (as have been discussed to death on other threads) but the one being discussed here is the obsession of those with maintaining gender norms.

Well thank God that Hilary Cass can see the same problem as the obsession that posters on here have. Does it not concern you, even just a little bit, that hundreds of children have been psychologically, physically and medically experimented on at the gids clinic @ Tavistock? That they, and the whistleblowers, are saying that they weren't trans; they were having other issues such as autism, homosexuality, bisexual, mental health issues, but we're railroaded down the trans tunnel regardless. Don't you have any empathy for them and feel some sense of relief that they'll now stand a chance of being listened to properly?

Doodledog

People get 'energised' because they feel that the trans agenda is dangerous on a number of levels...

What is bothersome about this (to me) is that there must be goodness knows how many transgender individuals who simply want to live their best lives in a way that feels comfortable to them, nothing more.

I have a trans gender woman friend - who has no "agenda" and is only absorbed by the interests we both share.

It is the TG 'activists' - those that disrupt women's groups and activities, and are often verbally aggressive and threatening, who are the problem. They might be a minority, but the sensational media reporting on them just stirs up antagonism towards the whole TG community, making life very difficult for those, like my friend, who just want to get on with their lives like everyone else.

As you celebrate over this closure consider the present position for those children needing gender advice and treatment

Recent waiting list figures:
Number of people on our waiting list: 11,293
Number of referrals received in the month: 329
Number of first appointments offered in the month: 56
Total appointments offered in the month: 917
We are currently offering first appointment to people who were referred in: January 2018
The data above is for April 2022.

In other words children are waiting 4 years for a first appointment. During that time they may access drugs on the net or share drugs with a friend
You are effectively celebrating children being failed in every aspect of their care.
If you want to read the figures gic.nhs.uk/appointments/waiting-times/

Good idea.

"The NHS could be banned from giving puberty blockers to children amid concerns that youngsters are being “rushed” into changing their gender.

Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak pledged to consider restricting the use of puberty blockers on Thursday night over concerns that “life-altering treatments” are being given to children before they are old enough to know whether they want to medically transition.

The Tory leadership contenders told The Telegraph they would act following the announcement that the NHS was shutting down the Tavistock transgender clinic after the Cass Review found it was “not safe” for children.

NHS England will instead move young people into regional centres that will take a more “holistic” approach to treatment and look at whether other mental health conditions could explain their gender dysphoria.

It also committed to begin urgent research on the impact of puberty blockers after Dr Hilary Cass warned in her report that the drugs could prompt the “rewiring of neural circuits” and affect parts of the brain responsible for decision-making and judgment.

Everyone who receives the drugs will now be placed on a trial, with data on the effects collected."

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/07/28/nhs-faces-crackdown-giving-puberty-blockers-children-tavistock/

I've had an interest for many years, based on personal experience in a couple of voluntary women's group which at times had trans women as members. I wouldn't say I have an obsession.

I think a few things (as have been discussed to death on other threads) but the one being discussed here is the obsession of those with maintaining gender norms.

Exactly. It's a mirror of the US right-wing. It's not really about care for the vulnerable, it's just enforcement of the status quo. The social shift towards gender fluidity is threatening to the binary system we live in therefore close-up on the control of gender issues, while ignoring poverty, the mental health tsunami, child abuse. It's an obsession. In the same way Trumpers were/are obsessed with Mexicans immigrating into the US, with control of people of colour, with abortion, while ignoring children in poverty and their own colonisation of other parts of the world.

What rubbish. By that 'logic' it follows that because your post concentrated on poverty, MH, child abuse and colonisation you don't care about cancer or climate change. How is posting on Gransnet an 'obsession'? And what makes you any less obsessed?

I think that when the Tavistock opened 'transitioning' children was a rare occurrence, and it has become more widespread since. As a result there are more people now with experience and expertise in the issues, so it is going to be easier to have a multidisciplinary approach.

If children are now going to be referred to clinics where fewer of them are given irreversible treatments before the age of consent, I can't help but thing that this is all to the good. If they are not considered old enough to make decisions about less important things, it seems wrong that they can make them on this topic. I'm not sure how this is going to work if the more 'trigger-happy' staff from the Tavistock are re-employed in the 'safer clinics', though.

It must be incredibly difficult for parents if a young child wants to 'change gender'. It's not something I've experienced, but I would want to do the right thing for the child, and would really have no idea what that would be, and would need the advice of experts to help me to help my child. I'm sure I would be happier if the experts I was referred to didn't have the reputation of the Tavistock ones, though.

growstuff

grannydarkhair

growstuff was referring to Jackie Green. growstuff believes “whether human beings can change sex is a matter of opinion”. This is just another reminder to me to not get involved in these threads, they’re really not good for my blood pressure ?

I usually ignore threads on this topic too, but I was bored. Quite honestly, I don't understand why people get so energised about it. Presumably they're just as concerned about the thousands of children who are abused, have mental health problems, live in poverty, etc. I can't understand why there are fewer threads about the latter.

Exactly. It's a mirror of the US right-wing. It's not really about care for the vulnerable, it's just enforcement of the status quo. The social shift towards gender fluidity is threatening to the binary system we live in therefore close-up on the control of gender issues, while ignoring poverty, the mental health tsunami, child abuse.

It's an obsession. In the same way Trumpers were/are obsessed with Mexicans immigrating into the US, with control of people of colour, with abortion, while ignoring children in poverty and their own colonisation of other parts of the world.

DiamondLily your post on this matter brings it home how very wrong things became at the Tavistock Clinic, it is a scandal actually.
We all know that teenagers can go through a difficult time and may think they should be a different gender, which may alter with a little time.Other factors such as perhaps really being gay or being autistic and confused about sex play a part too as the reporting suggests.
Men and women have always had a wide range of feelings and behaviours in any case, the softly spoken mild mannered man and the aggressive ready to shout man are both just as much men.

It's not just the tavistock the report contains information on puberty blockers. It will I think change the whole approach to care.

Presumably they can now be treated at a safer clinic.

Well, that's the crux of it isn't it? The Tavistock wasn't safe in any regard hence why the closure is so swift. Cass must have seen some pretty horrendous instances of clinical and psychological damage to have declared it not a safe or viable long-term option.

growstuff

grannydarkhair

growstuff was referring to Jackie Green. growstuff believes “whether human beings can change sex is a matter of opinion”. This is just another reminder to me to not get involved in these threads, they’re really not good for my blood pressure ?

I usually ignore threads on this topic too, but I was bored. Quite honestly, I don't understand why people get so energised about it. Presumably they're just as concerned about the thousands of children who are abused, have mental health problems, live in poverty, etc. I can't understand why there are fewer threads about the latter.

People get 'energised' because they feel that the trans agenda is dangerous on a number of levels, and others feel that transwomen are women. There are numerous threads on the topic which will show you in what ways and for what reasons people hold the point of view they do, so you could read through them to help you understand if you're still bored. It's a bit of a no-win situation, though. If anyone could be bothered to go through those reasons for the benefit of someone who usually ignores the topics, they would be accused of being 'exercised', and repeating themselves.
What do do, eh? You can't please everyone.

I don't feel that not starting threads about a topic means that someone is unconcerned about it - or that someone being interested in one topic means that they can't also be concerned about another. As a rule, something has to happen before a thread is started though. The thread about child abuse which is live just now, ('Another child dies at the hands of a mother') is going strong - something has happened that can be discussed - and when things happen people do start threads (as, of course, could you). Similarly, 'a thread saying 'Thousands of children have MH problems' is likely to stall fairly quickly without some sort of context. If there is a change in the provision of children's MH, however, the odds are that someone will pick up on it if the issue concerns them.

Speaking of things to be concerned about, incidentally, the Y chromosome appears to have about 4.5 million years before it is seriously endangered. I for one won't be putting it at the top of my list of things that keep me awake at night.

Thank goodness it’s closed, however what is to happen to all those vulnerable youngsters who have had their lives wrecked? I know it might have helped some but was it worth it for those it broke?

Galaxy

I am utterly grateful that the whistleblowers and women showed an interest in what they was going on at the tavistock. They were very brave and children with gender dysphoria and those who were experiencing other issues are safer because of them.

Presumably they can now be treated at a safer clinic.

I am utterly grateful that the whistleblowers and women showed an interest in what they was going on at the tavistock. They were very brave and children with gender dysphoria and those who were experiencing other issues are safer because of them.

Galaxy

I have 30 years in childrens services so I am very interested in when organisations and adults fail children. Particularly those with additional needs. Hope that's a good enough justification.
The data on who has been helped is not adequate that's the point.

That's a fair point, but is a separate issue from the one some people are trying to make.

I have 30 years in childrens services so I am very interested in when organisations and adults fail children. Particularly those with additional needs. Hope that's a good enough justification.
The data on who has been helped is not adequate that's the point.

Common sense breaking out at last.

"In the end it was NHS England that ordered the Tavistock trust to close down its gender identity clinic for children in the wake of a damning review by an eminent paediatrician.

But its far-reaching decision yesterday would never have been taken but for the brave voices of a few individuals who spoke out against the controversial centre.

Patients, parents and even the Tavistock’s own staff turned whistleblower, some putting their careers in jeopardy, to warn that vulnerable children unsure about their gender were being put at risk by being prescribed powerful drugs to stop the onset of puberty.

The first to raise concerns in 2005 was Sue Evans, a nurse at the Tavistock’s Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) in north London.

She was worried that teenagers were being assessed too quickly and that treatment plans were being influenced by transgender rights groups.

Her fears were not made public at the time, however, and for a number of years few questions were asked about the soaring number of referrals the clinic was receiving, except by concerned parents’ groups led by Stephanie Davies-Arai.

Then in late 2018, a senior member of staff told the trust’s board that children were wrongly being fast-tracked into changing gender and the psychological and social reasons behind their feelings were being dismissed.

group of parents also wrote to the board raising concerns that the GIDS team was being asked to ‘assess complex and difficult cases within a highly constrained time frame’.

A dynamite report by David Bell, then a staff governor, said that patients were being exposed to ‘long-term damage’ because the clinic could not ‘stand up to the pressure’ from ‘highly politicised’ campaigners and families.

He accused the service of providing ‘woefully inadequate care’ and that staff had ‘very serious ethical concerns’ about children making life-changing decisions with inadequate assessment or consent.

Dr Bell was then sent two letters threatening disciplinary action, including vague allegations of bullying.

And although his internal report led to a review by the trust’s medical director, Dinesh Sinha, early in 2019, which admitted staff caseloads were ‘excessive’ and there was lobbying from pressure groups, it concluded that the service was safe.

Then consultant psychotherapist Marcus Evans – whose wife Sue had first raised concerns years earlier – resigned in protest at the Tavistock’s response to doctors who raised the alarm.

He accused the trust of creating a ‘climate of fear’ and trying to ‘dismiss or undermine’ concerns, while 25 other clinicians signed a letter complaining about the attitude of managers.

The expert said there was no way to know whether these drugs, rather than ‘buying time’ for children to decide on their gender identity, might instead ‘disrupt that decision-making process’.

She raised concerns that the drugs could interrupt the process of the brain maturing, affecting children’s ability to exercise judgment."

I was told by former nurse Susan Evans: ‘Children with gender identity problems expect hormone blockers [drugs to stall puberty] to be handed out quickly.

‘They think these drugs will solve all their concerns: such as how they look, a lack of friends, physical changes and typical teenage angst.’

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11059641/Courage-parents-patients-whistleblowers-revealed-Tavistock-childrens-clinic-SHUT.html