By Megan Brock
The chemical and surgical mutilation of minors, known as child sex-changes, is built on junk science that lacks ethical justification, according to a new review published by the Trump administration.
The Department of Human Health and Services (HHS) published a review Thursday highlighting the lack of scientific evidence upholding the “gender-affirming” model of treatment for pediatric gender dysphoria, a psychological discomfort with one’s sex. The report details how the supposed benefits of child sex-change medical procedures are unclear, lacking both scientific evidence and ethical justification for their use.
“The evidence for benefit of pediatric medical transition is very uncertain, while the evidence for harm is less uncertain,” states the report.
Dr. Stanley Goldfarb, chairman at Do No Harm, a medical watchdog organization, praised the review in a statement provided to the the Daily Caller News Foundation.
“American children, especially those suffering from gender confusion, deserve better than to be used as a political pawn by gender activists. The Health and Human Services review of the scientific evidence and best practices in the treatment for pediatric gender dysphoria rightfully exposes a number of serious risks in the medical transition of young people,” Goldfarb told the DCNF. “The report cites a ‘lack of robust evidence’ for these medical procedures and most alarmingly finds that ‘WPATH suppressed systematic reviews its leaders believed would undermine its favored treatment approach.’”
“Do No Harm, its fellows, researchers, and members have been warning about the experimental and irreversible sex change interventions on children, and we are grateful and encouraged HHS is bringing needed scrutiny to the gender industry,” Goldfarb added. “It is clearer now more than ever that we must end this misguided practice and replace it with evidence-based treatment for gender confused kids.”
In the review, HHS directly acknowledges the risk of “significant harms” of using physical child sex-change interventions, such as puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgery, to treat the psychological problem of gender dysphoria. (RELATED: Video Shows Prominent Doctors Acknowledging, And Even Challenging, The Experimental Nature Of Sex Change Drugs)
“The ‘gender-affirming’ model of care includes irreversible endocrine and surgical interventions on minors with no physical pathology,” states the report.
“These interventions carry risk of significant harms including infertility/sterility, sexual dysfunction, impaired bone density accrual, adverse cognitive impacts, cardiovascular disease and metabolic disorders, psychiatric disorders, surgical complications, and regret. Meanwhile, systematic reviews of the evidence have revealed deep uncertainty about the purported benefits of these interventions.”
“Gender-affirming care” is a euphemism to describe cosmetic sex-change medical interventions that chemically and surgically mutilate an individual’s body.
The review ends with the conclusion that medical associations are failing vulnerable children by continuing to provide child sex-change interventions.
“While no clinician or medical association intends to fail their patients — particularly those who are most vulnerable — the preceding chapters demonstrate that this is precisely what has occurred,” states the review.
NEW: Today, @HHSGov released a comprehensive review of the evidence and best practices for treating children with gender dysphoria.
The review identifies “serious concerns” about sex change interventions on children.
“American children, especially those suffering from gender…
— Do No Harm (@donoharm) May 1, 2025
‘Consensus Does Not Guarantee Correctness’
The review provides an in-depth look at how major medical associations, such as the World Professional Association Of Transgender Health (WPATH), have created untrustworthy medical standards for gender confused children based on ideology, political pressure and medical consensus, rather than observable science.
WPATH is a transgender medical association that publishes sex-change clinical guidance called the most recent version Standards of Care, published in September 2022, which recommend hormones and surgeries to treat gender dysphoric children, and have widespread influence on the gender medical industry. The report notes the WPATH guidelines are “embedded in nearly all aspects of healthcare” including insurance reimbursement, delivery of care at pediatric hospitals and medical education. (THE WPATH TAPES: Behind-The-Scenes Recordings Reveal What Top Gender Doctors Really Think About Sex Change Procedures)
The HHS review points out the faulty scientific methodology used by WPATH in the creation of the Standards of Care, citing research from University of York which was included in the Cass Review, an April 2024 report on pediatric gender medicine from NHS England. The York analysis found the WPATH Standards of Care t0 be untrustworthy due to “serious deviations” from standard scientific methodology.
“The most influential sources of clinical guidance for treating pediatric [Gender Dysphoria] in the U.S. are the WPATH and [Endocrine Society Clinical Practice Guidelines] and the American Academy of Pediatrics’ (AAP) guidance. The York [systematic review] assessed all three documents as very low quality and did not recommend them for implementation,” states the HHS review.
EXCLUSIVE: A handful of pediatricians who perform sex-change procedures on children successfully pressured a major medical organization to remove age minimums for sex-change surgeries.
Read about how they did it from @MegEBrock here ⬇️ https://t.co/WMQ2GXcDq2
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) November 20, 2024
“Despite their lack of trustworthiness, for more than a decade WPATH guidelines have served as the foundation of the healthcare infrastructure for gender dysphoric (GD) youth in the United States,” states the HHS review.
WPATH did not immediately respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, who has called on WPATH to comply with President Trump’s order banning child sex-change, told the DCNF children need care that is “supported by science.”
“As a physician, I am extremely concerned that medical organizations continue to push irreversible gender transitions for children, ignoring the scientific data. Children need the best care that is supported by science, not extreme ideology,” said Dr. Cassidy. “I will continue to lead the charge with President Trump to protect children from irreversible harm.”
The HHS review also highlights how pressure from the American Academy of Pediatrics caused WPATH to remove age minimums from the Standards of Care.
“The issue of minimum ages resurfaced when the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) threatened to publicly oppose SOC-8 unless all age thresholds were eliminated— further exposing how political pressure, rather than scientific evidence or clinical judgment, dictated the final content of the guidelines,” states the review.
Through a series of public records request, the DCNF uncovered emails showing the AAP asked the four pediatricians — Jason Rafferty, Ilana Sherer, Juanita Hodax, and Brittany Allen — to review the SOC-8 on the organization’s behalf in 2022. Based on the four doctors’ review, the AAP strong-armed WPATH into removing sex-change surgery age minimums from the SOC-8. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Here’s How A Small Band Of Pediatricians Pushed Medical Org Into Nixing Age Minimums For Sex Changes)
The HHS review notes that in medicine “consensus does not guarantee correctness” and while multiple medical organizations seem to agree that sex-change interventions are the best way to treat gender dysphoria in children, this consensus is driven by a “small number” of medical professionals.
“U.S. medical associations played a key role in creating a perception that there is professional consensus in support of pediatric medical transition. This apparent consensus, however, is driven primarily by a small number of specialized committees, influenced by WPATH. It is not clear that the official views of these associations are shared by the wider medical community, or even by most of their members,” states the review.
THE WPATH TAPES: Behind-The-Scenes Recordings Reveal What Top Gender Doctors Really Think About Sex Change Procedures
From: @MegEBrock and @kliseanderson https://t.co/Dsvdc22vZx pic.twitter.com/1Eli4kuw9B
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) May 14, 2024
WPATH’s Global Education Initiative
The medical consensus around child sex-change procedures has in part been created through education provided by WPATH.
WPATH provides medical education through their Global Education Initiative (GEI) Collaborating with “pediatric gender clinics and hospitals, the American Medical Student Association, and the World Health Organization,” and offering courses “that serve as the core curriculum for clinical training in the U.S. and worldwide,” according to the HHS review.
Through a public records request, the DCNF obtained a link to a folder containing nearly 30 hours of recordings from WPATH’s GEI summit in September 2022 in Montreal, Canada, which included sessions on mental health, puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and sex change surgery. The recordings revealed that behind closed doors, top WPATH doctors discussed, and at times seemed to challenge, the organization’s own published guidelines for sex change procedures and acknowledged pushing experimental medical interventions that can have devastating and irreversible complications, according to the exclusive footage obtained by the DCNF.
In one recording Dr. Daniel Metzger, a WPATH-certified pediatric endocrinologist who works at British Columbia Children’s Hospital, said “kids have zero idea about their fertility.” Metzger explained how puberty blockers stop males from developing sperm and that it was unknown if girls placed on puberty blockers during the initial stages of puberty, as recommended by WPATH, would have eggs mature enough for fertility preservation. Metzger also described how puberty blockers can impact brain development, increase the risk of osteoporosis and stunt genital growth, which can leave males with a micropenis. (RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Top Trans Pediatric Doctors Admit In Unearthed Video That Puberty Blockers Aren’t As ‘Reversible’ As Advertised)
Dr. Scott Leibowitz, a co-lead in the development of the adolescent chapter of WPATH’s SOC 8 and current member of the WPATH Board of Directors, openly challenged the need for evidence-based medical care in a GEI recording obtained by the DCNF.
Leibowitz told the GEI audience that clinicians should not only consider medical evidence when providing interventions to transgender people but should weigh ethical considerations, such as “justice” for transgender people, when prescribing sex reassignment medical treatments to adolescents.
“Regardless of the evidence base, as I said evidence is one part of this, but also there’s an ethical human rights component to treating people. We don’t rely on evidence for every single treatment we do in medicine,” Leibowitz said.
“We have to look at the whole thing. Ethics, human rights, justice for trans people.”
Leibowitz also seemed to complicate WPATH’s position regarding sex change drugs producing positive mental health outcomes among gender dysphoria patients, explaining that initiating cross-sex hormones doesn’t always solve the mental health problems of young people in a GEI recording.
“I always say to my patients now that we’re starting testosterone or estrogen, now you can finally have mental health problems. Right?” said Leibowitz.
“And it’s really important because then parents don’t approach the kids saying ‘How come you’re having mental health problems? We thought that that testosterone was going to be the answer?’” Leibowitz added.
