NI Health Minister silent on puberty blocker trial

Mike Nesbitt, the Minister of Health for Northern Ireland, has refused to comment on whether he thinks the upcoming puberty blockers trial is safe.

Last week, protesters and MLAs gathered outside Stormont to call on the Executive to stop the trial, which a Freedom of Information request from the Institute found will also be open to children under 15 years in Northern Ireland as well as to children in Great Britain.

Similar calls have been made to UK Health Secretary Wes Streeting, and a parallel protest took place in London. Streeting has said he is “not comfortable” with the research project, but is committed to it as a recommendation from the Cass Review.

Irreversible impacts

DUP MLA Peter Martin posted that he was happy to stand with his DUP colleagues in the protest, commenting: “These drugs can have serious & irreversible impacts on the children who take them. What they actually need is support & counselling.”

Joanne Scannell from LGB Alliance spoke to the group outside Stormont, stating: “It’s unthinkable to subject one more child to medical intervention and experimentation”.

The Northern Ireland Women’s Rights Network stated: “Puberty should NOT be optional. Today we stood shoulder to shoulder with members of LGB Alliance to protest the puberty blocker trial.”

A spokesperson from the Department of Health responded, stating that the Cass Review was clear that “the evidence on care for children and young people with a diagnosis of gender incongruence is lacking” and explaining that the trial will “help to improve the evidence base for this important issue”.

Public opinion

A poll this month on behalf of Transgender Trend found that 63 per cent of the British public agree that the NHS puberty blocker trial should be stopped, with opposition being particularly strong among parents of under-18s.

Stephanie Davies-Arai, Director of Transgender Trend, called the results “a clear mandate from the British people to stop the trial”.

She explained: “The British public instinctively knows that medically experimenting on children is wrong. Most understand that children are too young to make medical decisions that will affect them for the rest of their lives.

“It’s not a party political issue but common sense. The government now needs to listen and do what’s right.”