The infamous UK-government-run Tavistock child transgenderism clinic has been accused by one expert of having ignored medical concerns for financial gain, among a series of shocking claims by a former governor.
Dr David Bell, a former governor of the now-infamous Tavistock & Portman NHS Foundation Trust, has alleged that the health service’s Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) ignored issues involving how transgenderism was being pushed onto children for financial gain.
More than 1,000 children were referred for puberty blockers at an experimental gender clinic where concerns were ignored to preserve a “gold dust” NHS contract, a new book* claims.
Former clinicians at the Gender Identity Development Service (Gids), part of the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust in London, have detailed how some “incredibly complex” children were placed on medication after one face-to-face assessment, despite many having a variety of mental health or family background problems.
More than a third of young people referred to the service had moderate to severe autistic traits, compared with fewer than 2 per cent of children in the general population. Some identified not just as a different gender, but a different ethnic background, such as Japanese or Korean.
Ireland’s socialised healthcare service, the HSE, was warned back in 2019 that children were being exposed to “unsafe” practices by the UK government’s Tavistock child transgenderism clinic.
Not everyone who worked at GIDS was happy with what was unfolding: some mental health professionals were deeply concerned with the medicalisation of children. They believed these children required talking therapies, not irreversible hormonal and surgical interventions. But these staff were in a difficult position: they were under pressure from ‘powerful lobbies’ to opt for medication, as a report from 2005 revealed:
‘…it is the consistent impression of a number of GIDU (Gender Identity Dysphoria Unit) staff that the service was coming under pressure to recommend the prescription of drugs more often and more quickly, and that the independence of professional judgement was also coming under increasing pressure. Young patients may threaten suicide if their anxieties are not immediately addressed. Parents and others may threaten to complain and there are powerful lobbies from older patients pressing for the use of medication, which even more worryingly, is now available without regulation via the internet. Clinicians will differ in their ability to resist the pressure to comply.’
*Time to Think: The Inside Story of the Collapse of the Tavistock’s Gender Service for Children by BBC journalist Hannah Barnes, released on 16 February, is an explosive record of a dangerous and greedy institution.