# Are Politicians Trying to Undermine the Cass Review?  ## Metadata - Author: [[Hannah Barnes]] - Full Title: Are Politicians Trying to Undermine the Cass Review? - Category: #articles - Summary: insert summary - My notes: - Summary: A recent committee session in Parliament raised concerns about the selection of witnesses discussing puberty blockers, as many were not qualified or relevant to the Cass Review findings. Questions were asked that seemed disconnected from the current understanding of gender-distressed young people's care, leaving some members frustrated. The session ultimately appeared to undermine the thorough research conducted in the Cass Review, leaving young people's needs inadequately addressed. - URL: https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/society/2025/01/are-politicians-trying-to-undermine-the-cass-review - Source File: web-only ## LLM Chats ## NotebookLM ## LLM Audio ## Highlights > According to Giordano, scientists who had looked into the impact of puberty blockers on the adolescent brain – on executive functioning, cognitive functioning or IQ – “found no difference in the scores of trans young people treated with puberty blockers compared to their cisgender cohorts”. The truth is that scientists just haven’t looked at [the cognitive impacts](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/apa.17150) properly at all. Animal studies and controlled case studies suggest that neurodevelopment will be impacted by pubertal suppression. But we don’t know by how much, or how long it may take people to catch up, if ever. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Giordano, who sits on the World Professional Association of Transgender Health Ethics Committee, seemed to dismiss concerns about the impact of puberty blockers on adolescent bones, too, claiming that there were “no cases” in the literature or reports of complaints from patients. Journalists *have* spoken to them though – both in [Sweden](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ow-XwdauYr0), and here in the UK. I have spoken with – and documented – the story of one young trans man who broke four bones while on puberty blockers and under Butler’s care. Butler told the committee that the breaking of bones was “not something we would see in puberty… Even if there is a change in bone density, it rarely gets into the range you would expect fractures to occur.” ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01jja0y09ghs6vxfd5t04cwjn4))