NHS-backed puberty blocker trial branded 'unlawful and illegitimate' amid High Court challenge

Campaigners have launched legal action against an NHS puberty blockers trial after concerns the treatment may cause "irreversible harm", including infertility issues, sexual dysfunction and other long-term health risks.

Health officials faced immediate backlash after they approved the trial last month, which will give more than 200 gender-questioning children to have access to puberty blockers.

Delivering her verdict on the Government's approval of the trial, Ms McAnena told GB News: "Well, the reason that the Health Secretary has given is that this is one of the recommendations of the Cass Review.

"But there are many recommendations in that review, and I think most of us thought that this would be an absolute last resort."

Highlighting the number of children who have already been subjected to puberty blockers, she added: "There's already something like 2,000 children that have had their puberty blocked and almost all of them, as far as we know, have gone on to cross sex hormones.

"They're all the children who went through the gender clinic at the Tavistock, which the Cass Review recommended should be closed down, and it has been closed down. So there's a huge population of young people, young adults now, who've already been through this treatment.

"They were supposed to be followed up and their outcomes were supposed to be studied before there would be any new trial, and that hasn't happened."

Advocating against the use of puberty blockers, the Sex Matters campaigner explained: "What we know historically is before puberty blockers were available, the vast majority of those children grew up - the cure for their distress was puberty.

"They went through puberty, they found out that they were young men or young women, and in many cases they were same-sex attracted, and being gender non-conforming as a child does correlate with growing up to be gay.

"So no one should be surprised that they feel that way and then they grow up to be gay. But when they're given puberty blockers, none of that happens. Instead, they lose sexual function, and that's because they almost without exception go on to cross-sex hormones."

Recalling the recent Supreme Court ruling on sex and gender earlier this year, Ms McAnena told GB News the trial is "not lawful".

She said: "Another problem with this is that after the For Women Scotland judgement at the Supreme Court this spring, it's not lawful or legitimate to be giving children treatment to stop their puberty so that they can pass as the opposite sex when they grow up.

"And that was the original rationale for this treatment, but the law now says you are your birth sex, come what may. So these children and their parents are being given a false promise."

As host Charlie Peters argued there will be "intensive support" for those taking part in the trial, Ms McAnena disagreed.

She said: "We know for a fact that when you block children's puberty with these drugs, they don't go through puberty. You'd need a very good reason to do that to any child.

"If someone has a life-threatening condition like a cancer that will kill them, then destroying their fertility and their sexual function might be justifiable. But for these children, that's not the case, and the evidence historically is that's not the case. So it's hard to see any reason why this should go ahead."

In a statement, a Department of Health and Social Care spokesman told GB News: "The expert Cass Review, which was accepted by the last Government and this one, recommended a ban on puberty blockers and that clinical research be carried out because of a lack of scientific evidence.

"This trial will help to provide the evidence that is currently lacking. Its approval came only after extremely rigorous safety checks and with multiple safeguards in place to protect young people's well-being, including clinical and parental approval."

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