NHS loophole allows puberty blockers for children
AN NHS loophole allows puberty blockers to be prescribed to children who want to change gender despite the drugs being banned following a landmark review.
Prescribing drugs that stop children from developing physically and neurologically was banned by the NHS last month following advice from an interim review led by Dr Hilary Cass, a leading consultant paediatrician.
Her final review into care for children who want to change gender, which is due to be published this week, is expected to reiterate that puberty blockers are harmful and should not be given except during research trials.
However, it is not expected to address a loophole that allows doctors to apply for special dispensation to prescribe the drugs under exceptional circumstances.
Liz Truss is leading demands from MPS and campaigners that the loophole be closed, amid fears that vulnerable children are not being protected.
The former prime minister, who is backing a law that would ban the drugs altogether, said: “In schools, hospitals and the courts, extremist activists have exploited loopholes in the law time and time again. Without primary legislation, the practice of prescribing puberty blockers to children will continue, despite the evidence of harmful consequences.”
The 2022 interim review by Dr Cass, the former president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, led to the closure of children’s gender services at the controversial Tavistock clinic. Following her initial findings, the NHS launched a consultation on banning puberty blockers, under which it proposed that doctors could prescribe them to children under 17 in “exceptional circumstances”.
Last month, in a move welcomed by ministers, the health service announced that they would be banned altogether, with NHS doctors only allowed to give them to children in clinical trials.
However, The Telegraph can reveal that officials made that decision because a protocol already exists that allows doctors to apply for a treatment that is not routinely available to be funded by the NHS. Doctors are able to submit “individual funding requests” to NHS England for any patient they believe would benefit from a specialised service treatment.
Dr Louise Irvine, a GP and co-chairman of the Clinical Advisory Network on Sex and Gender, said it should be “impossible” for doctors to justify the exceptional circumstances because “the whole rationale for stopping the prescription of puberty blockers is that there is no evidence of benefit”.
Others warned that the loophole risked “insufficient impartial medical scrutiny”, with Dr Caroline Johnson MP, a paediatrician, saying: “There is a risk of irreversible harm and irreversible changes with these drugs. If the NHS plans to allow them for children by individual applications – the question is, how high is the threshold of benefit which must be met?”
Nick Fletcher, a Tory MP, described the loophole as “abhorrent”. Both MPS are among a dozen Tories backing Ms Truss’s law that would ban the drugs altogether. However, she has faced opposition over her policies, which also include protecting women’s single-sex spaces. It is understood that Kemi Badenoch, the equalities minister, had wanted to back large sections of the Bill but was prevented from doing so by Cabinet colleagues.
Dr Cass’s final report, which is set to be published on Wednesday, is expected to look more closely at crosssex hormones and social transitioning among schoolchildren.
An NHS England spokesman said: “NHS services will not offer puberty suppressing hormones to young people seeking treatment and support for gender incongruence or gender dysphoria. As with all specialised services, doctors are able to apply for individual exceptions to be made, but these requests are only approved if there is clear clinical evidence that the patient would benefit more than others with the same condition.”