Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey is doubling down on his pursuit of regulations for “dangerous experimental procedures,” including “genital mutilation and castration” for adults identifying as transgender.
Bailey, a Republican, this week dropped an order restricting doctors from prescribing cross-sex hormones, hormone treatments, and genital surgeries for both children and adults in the wake of the Missouri General Assembly passing a law making those treatments illegal for children.
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The order, he told the Washington Examiner, was meant to “fill the gap” until the legislature could codify restrictions.
Bailey said that restrictions for adults are more difficult to promulgate, but that he would continue “educating the public about the dangerous and irreversible nature of these procedures, even as they relate to adults.”
He said some regulation can come through consumer protection laws, where Missouri can force doctors to provide accurate information and robust informed consent to the significant list of side effects these procedures and drugs carry with them.
“Adults are free to make the terrible decisions they want to make, but they should at least have access to the information and not be denied access to mental health services when they go into these clinics that would rather push them towards medication and the irreversible,” he said, adding that his office retains the “authority to promulgate additional rules as we deem necessary as emergency crisis situations develop as they relate to adults.
“If you’re going to be offering these kinds of medications and services, at least be honest that they’re experimental, they’re not approved,” Bailey continued. “They have long-term deleterious health consequences.”
Bailey became the first official in the United States to restrict such drugs and procedures for persons of all ages in the wake of a whistleblower report from a St. Louis gender clinic alleging what the Show-Me State attorney general calls “nothing short of child abuse.” The attorney general subsequently launched a statewide investigation into gender clinics.
Despite that, the American medical establishment pushes these procedures, which it labels “gender-affirming care,” as the “cure du jour” for treating gender dysphoria, according to a letter from 13 state attorneys general who said U.S. doctors need “a bit more intellectual humility” in light of many European countries halting the practice, citing dangers and a lack of medical proof of efficacy.
Groups like the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics claim their care model is “medically-necessary, evidence-based care that improves the physical and mental health of transgender and gender-diverse people.”
“I reject the notion that this is medicine. I reject the notion that this is treatment,” Bailey said. “There are zero FDA approvals or clinical trials showing the puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones are safe or effective at treating gender dysphoria.”
The dichotomy between guidance from the American medical establishment and countries like the United Kingdom, France, and Finland is stark.
“The European nations were willing to have an honest conversation about it,” Bailey said, adding that the AMA and AAP are “just wrong” about their assessment. He said his office was able to “shine the light of truth on the experimental and dangerous nature of this genital mutilation and castration. It’s not medicine.
“Some of these left-wing quacks in America are standing on an island alone,” he said, explaining that part of the issue is the medical industry’s monetary incentives.
“In the healthcare industry, there’s a monetization to continuing an ongoing treatment,” the Missouri Republican explained. “If you start treating a child for gender dysphoria using puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones, and they need continuing treatment for the rest of their lives, there’s an economic benefit to the pharmaceutical industry.”
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The media is to blame as well, Bailey said, because they want to “push this false narrative that these are safe or effective procedures and so they want to say things like, ‘gender transition healthcare.’ They cloak it under the guise of healthcare when in reality, it’s nothing short of experimental quackery.”
Bailey said his investigation into gender clinics is ongoing, and that he will continue to present the evidence to the General Assembly to look at further regulations.
