Ex-trans patient joins landmark legal case against gender clinic
Giving powerful drugs to children who are confused about their gender puts them on a “torturous” path, a former transsexual has warned as she joined a major legal action against the NHS. Keira Bell was given hormone blockers and cross-sex hormones when she was a teenager but has now returned to living as a woman. She says: “I do not believe that children and young people can consent to the use of powerful and experimental hormone drugs like I did.” Underlying causes Susan Evans, a former psychiatric nurse, launched the challenge, accusing the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust’s Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) of rushing decisions. Evans, a former employee, brought the case to the High Court alongside the mother of a 15-year-old autistic girl who is waiting for hormones from the clinic. Now Bell has joined the action, and speaking after a hearing explained her deep misgivings about the situation. “I believe that the current affirmative system put in place by t