U.K. ‘Gender Clinic’ Faces Civil Lawsuit

A law firm is pursuing legal action against the United Kingdom’s Tavistock Center, The Times of London recently reported.

Tavistock, which is in the process of shutting down, was the nation’s provider of “transgender” drugs, hormones and surgeries, treating 19,000 children with sexual identity confusion since 1989.

Tom Goodhead is chief executive of Pogust Goodhead, the legal firm pursuing litigation against the Tavistock clinic. He told The Times:

Children and young adolescents were rushed into treatment without the appropriate therapy and involvement of the right clinicians, meaning that they were misdiagnosed and started on a treatment pathway that was not right for them.

According to the news outlet:

Lawyers expect about 1,000 families to join a medical negligence lawsuit alleging vulnerable children have been misdiagnosed and placed on a damaging medical pathway.

They are accusing the gender identity development service [GIDS] at the Tavistock and Portman NHS [National Health Service] Trust of multiple failures in its duty of care.

This includes allegations it recklessly prescribed puberty blockers with harmful side effects and adopted an “unquestioning, affirmative approach” to children identifying as transgender.

Tavistock saw a absolutely explosive uptick in children with various levels of sexual identity confusion who were referred to the clinic. In 2009-10, 97 children were referred to the clinic. Less than a decade later, in 2017-18, 2,519 were being treated, a 2,500% increase.

The number of girls referred for such treatment increased from 40 to 1,806 during that time period, a more than 4,400% increase.

Such a large jump in numbers caused deep concern, and the NHS commissioned an independent review into services for children and young people with any form of sexual identity confusion.

Among other key points, an interim report found:

We need to know more about the population being referred and outcomes. There has not been routine and consistent data collection, which means it is not possible to accurately track the outcomes and pathways that children and young people take through the service.

There is lack of consensus and open discussion about the nature of gender dysphoria and therefore about the appropriate clinical response.

The review also found that overall services had “not been subjected to some of the normal quality controls that are typically applied when new or innovative treatments are introduced.”

The Times columnist Janice Turner excoriated the clinic for endangering children and irreparably harming their bodies:

British doctors are prescribing a drug used to chemically castrate rapists to halt puberty in children as young as 11. The drug isn’t even approved for child gender dysphoria. It reduces growth and bone density, sterilises and kills future libido. And, get this, we don’t know what it does to teenagers’ developing brains, or even if it works and they become happy, fulfilled trans adults. Because there’s no data, no long-term research.

Did you catch that? Despite the damage caused by puberty blockers, there is no data about how these drugs affect children. No long-term research.

This makes this full-blown experimentation on children.

Regardless of this lack of evidence, activists such as Assistant Secretary of Health Rachel Levine keep recommending “gender-affirming care” for minors.

A male, but claiming to be a woman, Levine said, “There is no argument among medical professionals – pediatricians, pediatric endocrinologists, adolescent medicine physicians, adolescent psychiatrists, psychologists, etc. – about the value and the importance of gender-affirming care.”

Likewise, former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki stated, “To be clear, every major medical association agrees that gender-affirming healthcare for transgender kids is a best practice and potentially lifesaving.”

This is deceptive.

Turner wrote about how transgender activists – and their allies in media, politics education – have worked to shut down any questions about the efficacy of treating confused children with drugs, hormones and surgery:

I still struggle to grasp why GIDS abhors research. If it cared about dysphoric children wouldn’t it want the best outcomes? If it had faith in its medical pathway, surely it wouldn’t mind testing its efficacy? Isn’t free and open discussion among fellow professionals the best way to improve treatment?

Gender ideology is driving the mistreatment of these children, not careful science. While Tavistock is shutting down its operations, regional children’s hospitals across England and Wales will move to provide “gender services.”

And here in the U.S., there are hundreds of “gender clinics” doing similar medical experimentation on children.

Children struggling with sexual identity confusion need our care and compassion. They need help embracing their biological reality – not dangerous and disfiguring experimentation. They need help coming to terms with underlying emotional and psychological issues at play in their gender confusion.

A child’s sex is not something that needs to be “treated” with drugs, hormones and surgeries. Puberty is a normal maturation process – not a disease that needs to be stopped.

Let’s hope this lawsuit succeeds, and that it causes health care providers to back away from irreparably damaging young people.

Related articles and resources:

British Lawsuit Says Children Are Too Young To Consent To ‘Transgender’ Medical Procedures

Questioning Drugs, Hormones and Surgery for Youth Confused about Their Sexual Identity

Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria – Researcher’s Work Vindicated

U.K Moves to Protect Gender-Confused Children from Hormones, Drugs and Surgeries

When Transgender Issues Enter Your World

World’s Largest Youth Trans Clinic Shuts Down Over Poor Science

For more Focus on the Family videos, books and articles about transgender issues, go to Transgender Resources.

Photo from Shutterstock.