RFK, Jr., Releases Report Attacking Medical Care for Trans Children

RFK, Jr. releases report attacking medical care for trans children

By Dan Vergano

On Wednesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. released a study critical of gender-affirming care for minors. It updates a widely criticized study published in May.

The American Medical Association and many other major medical organizations support psychological and medical treatments that help transgender children live as the gender with which they identify. Between 2.5 and 8.4 percent of children identify as transgender or gender diverse. This means they identify as a different gender or have a gender expression that does not conform to the norms of their sex assigned at birth. Gender-affirming treatment may include puberty-blocking hormones and sex hormones such as testosterone and estrogen. The effects of puberty blockers are reversible; sex hormones cause longer-lasting effects.

The Department of Health and Human Services’ recently released report asserts that gender-affirming care is harmful, contrary to widespread medical consensus. An HHS press release claims to have found that “the harms of sex rejection procedures – including puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries – are significant, long-term, and too often ignored or poorly followed.” In a statement contained in that press release, RFK Jr. said such care has “inflicted lasting physical and psychological harm on vulnerable young people.”

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The May HHS report drew criticism for its lack of transparency about the identities of its authors and for its advocacy of unproven psychotherapy for transgender and gender-diverse children, a population at high risk for suicide. The new report revealed its nine authors, most of whom are known critics of gender-affirming care.

“Now that the perpetrators have come forward, they can be identified as the engineers of a cottage industry that exists solely to dismantle health care for a vulnerable group of people,” says Meredithe McNamara, an adolescent medicine specialist at the Yale School of Medicine and co-author of an influential UK Cass Review 2024 review of gender-affirming care. “Transgender identity is real, transgender people of all ages thrive when they have access to the care they need, and politics needs to get out of medicine. »

“Calling this report ‘political’ is simply wrong,” said Emily Hilliard, HHS press secretary. “We will continue to follow the science wherever it leads us, even when the results challenge entrenched interests or privileged narratives. »

“Our group included clinicians and researchers from across the political spectrum. The administration gave us complete independence to follow the evidence wherever it led us,” Evgenia Abbruzzese, co-author of the HHS study, said in a statement sent by a representative. She adds that the reevaluation of gender-affirming care “reflects a familiar medical model: well-intentioned innovation followed by evidence-based correction.” »

An HHS press release included peer reviews of the new report, including one from the American Psychiatric Association (APA), which found that “its underlying methodology lacks sufficient transparency and clarity for its conclusions to be taken at face value.” The report’s authors rejected these criticisms. (The APA says it stands by its criticism.) The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Endocrine Society declined to review the report, according to a statement in the report.

“Gender-affirming care is not fringe; it is standard, developmentally appropriate health care,” says pediatrician Bianca Allison, a member of Physicians for Reproductive Health, in response to the HHS report. “It is individualized, prudent and, as every major medical organization has stated and mounting evidence indicates, can save lives.”

The release of the new report follows Republican political campaigns in recent years that have focused on restricting trans children’s participation in sports and the use of locker rooms in schools. President Donald Trump issued an executive order in January titled “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation.” The executive order contributed to the widespread closure of hospital programs treating transgender and gender diverse children following threats of withdrawal of federal funding.

The AMA and AAP then issued a joint statement Wednesday, to “reject characterizations of our approach to gender-affirming care as negligent or ideologically motivated, and particularly challenge the false claim that our members have engaged in ‘professional misconduct’ or betrayed their oath in any way.” These claims, rooted in politics and partisanship, misrepresent the consensus of medical science, undermine the professionalism of doctors, and risk harm to vulnerable young people and their families. »

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