‘Puberty blockers must be banned in Scotland’

Scottish children must be protected from the harmful effects of puberty-blocking drugs, a leading academic and political advisor has said.

Writing in The Herald, Glasgow-born Doctor Azeem Ibrahim OBE highlighted the psychological, developmental and physical dangers associated with the drugs and called for them to be banned.

In May, Scotland’s social care watchdog – the Care Inspectorate – was criticised for steering gender-confused children towards medical and surgical transition.

Risk-laden

In his opinion piece for the newspaper, Dr Ibrahim referred to a recently published letter in the Wall Street Journal from a group of international experts which criticised ‘gender-affirming care’.

He explained: “Gender-affirming care is code for the belief that hormones and surgery is the best and primary treatment for gender dysphoria”.

ideology comes first and children come second

Rather than benefitting minors, he reported, the experts had found that such an approach risked “permanent sterility, regret, and lifelong dependence on repeat surgeries and medication” and failed to show any mental health benefits.

“This”, he continued, “is something that every parent across Scotland, deep in their hearts, knew already to be true”.

‘Ideology first’

Dr Ibrahim argued that by far “the best approach” to gender confusion “is to love your children and take no medical intervention”.

Describing puberty blockers as “dangerous and irreversible”, he also pointed to evidence that showed they locked children in “to even more devastating outcomes”.

The claim that puberty-blocking drugs were “fully reversible” was, he said, “scandalously misleading”. But, the academic continued, despite the potency of the drugs being used, for activists “ideology comes first and children come second”.

He concluded: “we cannot allow activists masquerading as experts to have the final word any longer. We need our ethics to be based on compassion and understanding rather than politics.”