As Sarah covered yesterday, this week, Jamie Reed, a former healthcare worker at a transgender clinic spoke out in a bombshell report in The Free Press about how “morally and medically appalling” “gender-affirming” health care is on young people. In the report, Reed recounted her experience working as a case manager at the Washington University Transgender Center at St. Louis Children’s Hospital. There, Reed worked for four years and saw “around a thousand” young people who were struggling with their gender identity.
“I left the clinic in November of last year because I could no longer participate in what was happening there. By the time I departed, I was certain that the way the American medical system is treating these patients is the opposite of the promise we make to ‘do no harm.’ Instead, we are permanently harming the vulnerable patients in our care,” Reed wrote in her piece.
In addition, Reed claimed that “anyone who raised doubts [about the care] ran the risk of being called a transphobe.”
According to Reed, allowing minors to receive hormone therapy treatment was simple. Kids could get started on “gender-affirming” treatment after a couple quick visits with a therapist. And, in some cases, they would take patients from the “inpatient psychiatric unit” at the hospital for treatments.
“The mental health of these kids was deeply concerning—there were diagnoses like schizophrenia, PTSD, bipolar disorder, and more. Often they were already on a fistful of pharmaceuticals,” Reed explained. “This was tragic, but unsurprising given the profound trauma some had been through. Yet no matter how much suffering or pain a child had endured, or how little treatment and love they had received, our doctors viewed gender transition—even with all the expense and hardship it entailed—as the solution.”
All in all, Reed said the experience felt like “building the plane while we are flying it.”
On Thursday, St. Louis Children’s released a statement calling Reed’s allegations “disturbing” (via Washington University in St. Louis):
We are alarmed by the allegations reported in the article published by The Free Press describing practices and behaviors the author says she witnessed while employed at the university’s Transgender Center. We are taking this matter very seriously and have already begun the process of looking into the situation to ascertain the facts. As always, our highest priority is the health and well-being of our patients. We are committed to providing compassionate, family-centered care to all of our patients and we hold our medical practitioners to the highest professional and ethical standards.
Since Reed’s article was published, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey, a Republican, announced an investigation into the center. And, Sen. Josh Hawley, also a Republican, is calling for a federal investigation, according to KSDK.
The Washington University Transgender Center isn’t the first gender clinic to come under fire. Townhall covered how Vanderbilt University Medical Center began offering gender care for kids because it’s a “big money maker.” The revelations led to the center wiping its gender webpages and Republican lawmakers calling for investigations. Ultimately, Vanderbilt suspended all permanent transgender operations on minors until further notice.