Medical Group Backs Youth Gender Treatments, but Calls for Research Review

Last year, Sweden’s national health care oversight body similarly determined  that, on the basis of its systematic review, “the risks of puberty-inhibiting and gender-affirming hormone treatment for those under 18 currently outweigh the possible benefits.”

In the United States, a small group of pediatricians has pushed for a similar review from the A.A.P., one of the few institutions with enough centralized power to influence health care practices. Dr. Julia Mason, a pediatrician in Gresham, Ore., co-founded a group called the Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine that has been highly critical of gender treatments for minors. Since 2020, she said, she has unsuccessfully lobbied the academy’s leadership to commission a systematic review. Dr. Mason said she was pleased the group finally decided to take a close look at the data. “We are making strong recommendations based on weak evidence,” she said.