A landmark healthcare review has called on the NHS to ensure gender identity services for young people match the standards of its other forms of care and support.
Too often their care is blighted by lengthy waiting lists and being side-lined from local care services, which is leaving them having to do their own research around gender identity due to lack of expert help from NHS practitioners, according to the review by paediatrician Dr Hilary Cass.
She also warns that “noise and increasingly toxic, ideological and polarised public debate” around gender identity among young people has made the work of her review “significantly harder and does nothing” to support young people who are already feeling stressed.
“We have to cut through the noise and polarisation to recognise that they need the same standards of high-quality care to meet their needs as any other child or young person,” said Cass.
