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This prestigious journal got it wrong
I recently told you about Dr Peter Ridd, the professor who was sacked by James Cook University after disagreeing with findings by some of his colleagues about the Great Barrier Reef. He is now seeking to appeal his dismissal in the High Court of Australia.
Dr Ridd’s research suggests that some studies claiming the Great Barrier Reef is dying are unreliable. However, such unreliability is no surprise.
A few years ago, a survey by the respected science journal Nature found that more than 70% of researchers have tried and failed to reproduce another scientist's experiments. A majority of those surveyed agreed that there is a “crisis of reproducibility”.
And last week we saw yet another example of untrustworthy science, this time on transgender treatment.
The Australian (12/8/20) reported that the prestigious American Journal of Psychiatry has had to publish an extraordinary correction to a 2019 US-Swedish paper.
This widely praised, peer-reviewed paper had claimed that transgender surgery – such as breast removal or genital reconstruction – reduced the need for mental health treatment. This claimed benefit of transgender surgery has been used to push for easier access to such treatment.
Dr Michelle Telfer, clinic director at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne has argued that mastectomies improve the mental health of “trans boys”. Lobbying by Telfer succeeded in securing funding of $6 million from the Andrews government in Victoria to cut waiting times for treatment.
But last month, the American journal retracted this claim. It published a correction, an editorial and letters from a dozen psychiatrists, clinicians and researchers in four countries. They identified multiple flaws in the 2019 paper. Faced with the criticisms, the authors of the original paper acknowledged that “the results demonstrated no advantage of surgery” for subsequent mental health.
As a leading researcher pointed out, the 2019 paper had ignored post-surgery suicides!
The correction has come not a moment too soon. The original US-Swedish paper had been hailed by Australian trans activists in their campaign to achieve full Medicare cover for all trans surgery.
Treatment guidelines from the Melbourne Royal Children’s Hospital transgender clinic argue for trans breast removal for girls as young as 16 with gender dysphoria (distressed by their biological sex).
This campaign comes at a time when the number of gender dysphoric children seeking treatment is rising faster than ever before. The spike in cases may be linked to “copycat” pressures from social media. Many of these children have autistic traits.
FamilyVoice has been alerting MPs about this worrying trend. We continue to urge federal health minister Greg Hunt to set up a national inquiry into the causes and treatment of childhood gender dysphoria.