The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) relied on leftist politics that contradict medical research to create its highly influential clinical recommendations for giving gender-confused children opposite-sex hormones and surgeries, say 20 state attorneys general in a letter released this morning. In so doing, the AGs say, the AAP may have violated state consumer protection laws that require accuracy in selling products and services.
“[W]hen it comes to treating children diagnosed with gender dysphoria, the AAP has abandoned its commitment to sound medical judgment,” write the attorneys general plus the Senate president and House speaker of Arizona’s legislature to the current and incoming AAP presidents.
The AAP claims in a 2018 policy statement that using puberty-blocking drugs to treat children with gender dysphoria is “reversible.” That “is misleading and deceptive,” the legal officials state. “It is beyond medical debate that puberty blockers are not fully reversible but instead come with serious long-term consequences.” The letter says this AAP claim of transgender intervention reversibility “requires immediate retraction and correction.”
Reached for comment Tuesday morning, AAP spokeswoman Lisa Robinson said she hadn’t seen the letter yet. The letter cites an April 2024 comprehensive research review commissioned by the United Kingdom’s health service, known as the “Cass report.” It found the irreversible negative consequences of puberty-blocking drugs can include:
- interfering with brain development
- compromising healthy bone density
- damages to metabolic health, or the body’s ability to use energy efficiently, leading to weight gain, weight loss, and other health problems
- loss of normal experiences of puberty.
The attorneys general say AAP relied on politics rather than medicine in making its transgender recommendations for children, by largely copying the medical recommendations of an activist organization called the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH).
R&I ~ MJM
Thurston Howell III