As American physicians and politicians have amped up the push to sterilize and mutilate children in the name of “gender-affirming care,” the Swedish Agency for Health Technology Assessment and Assessment in Social Services (it sounds better in Swedish, I would assume) has issued a research review that tells us what we already knew:

There simply is no good evidence on the benefits of hormone treatments and surgery for gender dysphoric youth. There is concocted evidence, but nothing that rises to the level of scientific research.

None. Zip. Nada. 

Therefore such treatment should be considered “experimental,” and should only be done within well-designed scientific studies that aim to determine the dangers and benefits of the treatments.

2/2. Additional information and media contacts here:https://t.co/5aXSyo7B0L

Ping. @AACAP @APApsychiatric @barnlakaren @RCPCHtweets https://t.co/Dv58V1jRS4

— Jonas Ludvigsson (@ludvigsson) April 19, 2023

The conclusions reached come from a systematic review of all the literature on gender transition up to 2021. It turns out that there are nearly 10,000 papers on such studies, but almost all of them are fatally flawed and hopelessly biased. Out of all the literature available, the researchers found 24 that met the criteria of being, at most, only seriously biased.

There were zero randomized controlled trials to study since none exist. Not one.

Every study available was hopelessly compromised by having few patients, constant turnover as people drop in and out, and very short follow-up times. The maximum period a patient was followed was four years, but that was unusually long. There is no evidence of long-term benefits, because none was collected beyond a short window, and no evidence regarding potential regret (no detransitioners were reported, despite reports that such people exist).

Basically, all the studies are based on collecting a group of people who want to transition, weeding out the people who change their minds along the way, and dropping the patients off soon after the treatments are done. An assessment is done shortly after the treatments, success is claimed, and then everybody shut their eyes and hoped for the best.

It can be kindly called Junk Science. Total junk.

The one solid piece of evidence from the studies is that there is bone density loss for patients taking hormone treatments. So basically the only solidly established finding is that in the time period studied bone density declined. It may return, it may get worse. Who knows? Nobody has cared to follow up with the patients.

There was also no follow-up with the high number of patients who dropped out of studies for one reason or another.

In short, all the research is slipshod, highly biased, short-term, uncontrolled…just all very bad. And it is bad mainly because the people doing the studies are advocates of medical instead of psychological treatment of gender dysphoric patients. They began with conclusions and worked their way backward–to the extent that they weeded out the patients who wouldn’t fit their conclusions.

The bottom line is that–not according to me or any activists, but according to the Swedish government’s health research agency–there simply is no evidence at the moment that hormone and surgical treatments have any positive effects over the long term for children provided the care.

The only solid evidence is that there is bone density loss. That’s it. The rest is all smoke and mirrors.

The authors don’t come out and say “Stop!” Rather, their finding is that randomized controlled studies with long-term follow-up are required to find out what works and what doesn’t and that any medical treatments for gender “affirming” care should only take place within such studies.

None of this is a surprise, of course. Anybody who has followed the issue over the past few years could figure it out from even a modestly careful reading of both the studies and the public debate. Everybody involved in “gender-affirming care” is an activist, and they make wild claims with little evidence.

They use the new hot term “settled science” as a shield, not a description of reality. It is a rhetorical device and has zero relationships to the truth, as so little of what we are fed these days has.

It is no surprise that this research comes out of Sweden. The country appears to be developing an allergy to accepting the faddish medical consensuses that appear out of nowhere, as happened with COVID. And while one case of being right while bucking the trend is not proof of infallibility–it could be luck–it is an indication that the medical establishment in Sweden (and its government) is for some reason uniquely immune to the social pressures that are distorting medical research and policy.

Sweden is hardly a socially conservative country, and the Swedish government has been very open for decades to gender treatment. So it is unlikely that a bias against such treatments explains the results of this literature analysis. The conclusions are robust, have been reviewed for bias by outside researchers, and reflect a considered judgment of the evidence.

It’s just that the evidence for “gender-affirming care” is not there. It’s an ideologically motivated bunkum. This is why European countries are rapidly pulling back from offering it to minors.

In the US the opposite is the case. State after state is not only promoting the sterilization and mutilation of children, they are actively working to break court orders and custody arrangements in order to facilitate it. They are becoming, in fact, kidnapping sanctuary states where non-custodial parents can take children on hormone and surgery tourism. Colorado just joined the trend.

This is sick. He is sick (Gov Polis). “Come mutilate & chemically castrate your child here!” https://t.co/uqZhdYDayQ

— Megyn Kelly (@megynkelly) April 18, 2023

This is going to end very badly for a lot of people–but not the doctors, scientists, or politicians who promote it.

Just as with defunding the police, there will be thousands of victims and broken lives left in the wake of a horrendous public policy. Lots of money will be made, the grifters fed their spiffs, and the victims left out in the cold.

It is evil.