The BMA’s stance on puberty blockers defies the key principle of medicine: first, do no harm

‘Studies suggest… that a childhood diagnosis of gender dysphoria is not predictive of a lasting trans identity in adulthood.’ Photograph: Ronnie Chua/Getty Images/iStockphoto

We entrust doctors with our health. Patients have the right to expect that those doctors will make decisions based on evidence-based clinical guidelines, not modish fads, grounded in the “first, do no harm” principle. That’s perhaps never more important than when it comes to life-altering medical intervention for children.

So it’s hard to make sense of a decision by the governing council of the doctors’ union, the British Medical Association, to pass a motion criticising a groundbreaking evidence review of healthcare for gender-questioning children, led by the distinguished paediatrician Hilary Cass.