Unlike peers in the United States, the European medical community is expressing doubts about medical interventions in treating children suffering from distress over gender identity, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The United Kingdom, France, Finland, Norway, and Sweden are urging caution in the use of puberty blockers and hormones for minors. Puberty blockers suppress the physical changes of adolescence as a treatment for those distressed over their gender.
"These countries have done systematic reviews of evidence," Leor Sapir, a fellow who studies transgender care at the conservative-leaning Manhattan Institute think tank, told WSJ. "They've found that the studies cited to support these medical interventions are too unreliable, and the risks are too serious."
The U.K.'s publicly funded National Health Service this month limited the use of puberty blockers to clinical trials.
Canada, Spain, and Australia area among countries still allowing puberty blockers as a clinical option. However, some medical experts in those countries also are urging a cutback.
In January, the president of the Italian Psychoanalytic Society wrote a public letter to the Italian prime minister expressing "serious concerns" over the use of puberty blockers, WSJ reported.
The American healthcare industry, in contrast, has defended medical interventions for transgender minors for years.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved puberty blockers in 1993 for children going through puberty at an unusually early age. But the FDA hasn't approved puberty blockers to treat gender dysphoria, the distress felt over a conflict between a child's gender identity and the sex recorded at birth, WSJ reported.
In a congressional hearing last week, Republicans and their expert witnesses repeatedly cited European examples of increased caution with the treatments. They also blamed Democrats and the U.S. medical community as having gone too far in making treatments available for minors, WSJ said.
"It's beneficial to see European countries coming to their senses," Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, told WSJ after citing U.K. systematic evidentiary reviews of puberty blockers in last week's hearing.
Crenshaw added that transgender care will be an issue in the 2024 election.
"This is the issue of our time. This is a hill we're going to die on," Crenshaw said, WSJ reported.
Since late last year, more than a dozen Republican-run states have passed restrictions on medical interventions as part of transgender care.
Survey results recently released by the Washington Post and KFF, an independent polling and research firm, showed 68% are opposed to the use of puberty blockers in children ages 10 to 14.
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