Press Release – Shining a Light on Gender Identity Services: What did the Cass Review Find?

Dr Julie Maxwell has written a short paper on behalf of the Anscombe Bioethics Centre on the Cass Review, the recent independent inquiry into gender identity services for children and young people in England and Wales.

Over recent years there has been an explosion in the numbers of children and young people identifying as transgender and widespread acceptance of a belief in gender identity as something separate from biological sex. The idea that someone’s innate sense of their own gender is what determines whether they are male or female, or some other gender identity, has led to the use of medical and surgical pathways designed to alter a person’s body to fit with how they feel.

The Review was undertaken by Dr Hilary Cass OBE, a previous president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. It is the most thorough assessment that has yet been undertaken in this country of the evidence for the medical treatment of distress in young people related to gender identity. The Review has uncovered the way in which a vulnerable and distressed group have not received the same quality of care as other children and young people who are experiencing distress that is not gender-related.

Dr Maxwell worked as a Community Paediatrician for more than 20 years. She is also a member of the Church of England General Synod. Her paper ends by highlighting the recent pastoral reflections on gender issued by the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales. These reflections came out shortly before the Final Report of Cass Review and in some ways anticipate its findings.

‘It should also be recognised that social ‘transition’ (living in the opposite gender role) can have a formative impact on a child’s development and can set a child on a path towards later medical interventions. Care should be taken to avoid this especially with young children.’

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Notes to Editors:

• Any part of the above can be quoted as coming from our Public Bioethics Fellow, Dr Mehmet Çiftçi.
• For more information see Dr Maxwell’s essay, Shining a Light on Gender Identity Services: How The Cass Review Shows The Need For Evidence-Based Paediatric Medicine.
• For more information on the Anscombe Bioethics Centre, see our website: www.bioethics.org.uk
• For interviews or comment, contact: media@bioethics.org.uk