Medical professionals and parents are complaining that the highly controversial transgender treatment of children, which can be irreversible, is becoming increasingly harder to perform in the state of Florida.
Notably, Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis has said that doctors who perform transgender surgery on children should be sued. Moreover, the Florida Department of Health has recommended against such controversial surgeries and puberty blockers, which can chemically castrate children.
Numerous pediatric centers have stopped taking on patients to their gender clinics and have ceased prescribing puberty blockers and hormones, complained Michael Haller, chief of pediatric endocrinology at the University of Florida.
“This is another example of politics interfering with the inviolability of the doctor-patient relationship,” Haller told the Tampa Bay Times. “I expect to see additional situations in which patients are forced to seek care outside of our state.”
Miami’s Nicklaus Children’s Hospital is one of the facilities no longer taking on kids in its gender program, according to the outlet. The hospital has even removed the gender program page from its website due to “a number of factors,” hospital spokesperson Faud Kiuhan said.
Sidhbh Gallagher, a Miami plastic surgeon specializing in gender transitions, including on children, said that hospitals are unwilling to allow her to use its operating rooms to perform such surgeries.
“Patients are scared. They’re upset,” Gallagher said. “These are powerful bodies that are targeting them.”
A mother of a 16-year-old biological girl complained that her child’s double mastectomy was canceled at Tampa General Hospital days before the surgery was scheduled.
The mother, who wished to stay anonymous, told the Times her child has been binding her breasts since seventh grade to make the chest smaller.
After the surgery was canceled in June, the mother traveled to Chicago to have her child’s healthy breasts removed by Dr. Loren Schecter, director of gender affirmation surgery at Rush University Medical Center.
“They’re prepared to undergo the procedure and then you get a phone call that the surgery is now canceled,” Schecter said. “That’s quite traumatic.”
The Florida Department of Health on April 20 released guidance advising against medical transgender treatment and social transitioning for kids.
“Due to the lack of conclusive evidence, and the potential for long-term, irreversible effects, the Department’s guidelines are as follows: Social gender transition should not be a treatment option for children or adolescents. Anyone under 18 should not be prescribed puberty blockers or hormone therapy. Gender reassignment surgery should not be a treatment option for children or adolescents. … Children and adolescents should be provided social support by peers and family and seek counseling from a licensed provider,” the guidance said.
DeSantis in May told political commentator Lisa Marie Boothe that he would support a ban on sex change operations for youths.
“I think that it’s something that — you can’t get a tattoo if you’re 12 years old,” he explained. “When they say ‘gender-affirming care,’ what they mean, a lot of times is, you are really, you’re castrating a young boy, you’re sterilizing a young girl, you’re doing mastectomies for these very young girls.”
“And, here’s the thing, what our guidance pointed to, and [Surgeon General Joseph Ladopo] did a great job, for these young kids, 80% of the cases resolve themselves as they grow up, and so you’re doing things that are permanently altering them, and then they’re not gonna be able to reverse that, and so I don’t think it’s appropriate for kids at all,” the governor continued. “I think the guidance is right, but I think that there should be additional protections.”
Earlier this month, DeSantis said doctors who perform such trans surgeries on kids need to be held legally liable.
“But they don’t tell you what that is, is they are actually giving very young girls double mastectomies, they want to castrate these young boys,” the Republican said. “That’s wrong, and so we’ve stood up and said both from the health and children well-being perspective, you don’t disfigure 10, 12, 13-year-old kids based on gender dysphoria.”
“Eighty percent of it resolves anyways by the time they get older,” DeSantis repeated. “So why would you be doing this? … I think these doctors need to get sued for what’s happening.”
.@GovRonDeSantis: "They wanna castrate these young boys. That's wrong… I think these doctors need to get sued for what's happening." pic.twitter.com/UpHe1qC02M
— Daily Wire News (@DailyWireNews) August 3, 2022
Related: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis: Doctors Who Perform Transgender Surgeries On Kids Need To ‘Get Sued’