Teens crowdfunding to pay for ‘sex-swap’ surgery

Young people who struggle with gender confusion are raising money online to pay for cross-sex hormones and irreversible surgery.

According to the Daily Mail, hundreds of teenagers are raising significant sums of money through internet crowdfunding campaigns to finance dramatic life changing procedures at private clinics.

The newspaper also found that the unlicensed business GenderGP, founded by the disgraced medic Helen Webberley, offers ‘tips’ to children on its website on how to launch an appeal for donations.

Thousands of pounds

The Mail said that one 13-year-old boy, who believes he is ‘trapped in the wrong body’, received over £14,000 via GoFundMe to pay for puberty blockers.

Another teenager reportedly raised £20,000 online to pay for his “transition from male to female, including hormone treatment and surgery”.

In a further example, the newspaper referred to an 18-year-old asking for £8,000 on a social media platform “to undergo top surgery” by a private surgeon based in London.

GenderGP

GenderGP is an unlicensed gender clinic that offers puberty blockers to children through its website.

Based overseas, the drugs business bypasses regulatory safeguards to issue prescriptions to children in the UK via an online service.

It currently recommends that “families crowdfunding for puberty blockers and trans healthcare for under 18’s use the GoFundMe website”.

It claims: “GoFundMe have indicated that they are happy to host and release the funds for crowdfunders raising money for trans kids to get private transgender healthcare and puberty blockers prescribed by GenderGP.”

‘Dangerous’

Parent group Transgender Trend told the Mail: “What is happening is dangerous for a whole generation because no one knows the consequences.

“Crowdfunding has meant that vulnerable young people can go to private doctors in the UK and abroad, who take their money for drugs and surgery with fewer questions asked.”