A recent news piece published in Medscape (February 15th) describes the actions taken by the Italian Psychoanalytic Society to opose the use of puberty blockers in cases of gender dysphoria. This was met with an immediate response in the form of an open letter issued by a large number of scientific societies, including SIGIS, the Italian Society of Endocrinology (SIE), the Italian Society of Pediatrics, the Italian Society of Pediatric Endocrinology and Diabetology, the Italian Society of Andrology and Sexology, the Italian Society of Pediatric Psychiatry, and the National Observatory on Gender Identity. See beginning of the article below:

Italian Psychoanalysts Oppose the Use of Puberty Blockers for Gender Dysphoria

The debate about the use of puberty blockers for gender dysphoria erupted in Italy on January 12 when the Italian Psychoanalytic Society (Società Italiana di Psicanalisi, SPI) issued a call to the Ministry of Health signed by its president Sarantis Thanopulos. The document expresses “great concern” about the use of drugs that block pubertal development of minors diagnosed with gender dysphoria. The concerns are followed by a list of warnings based on the idea that the “ongoing trials circumvent careful scientific evaluation.” Finally, the document calls for a “rigorous discussion.”

“The diagnosis of ‘gender dysphoria’ in prepubertal age is based on the claims of the concerned individuals and cannot be subject to careful evaluation as long as the development of sexual identity is still in progress,” the document stated. “Only a minority of children who state that they do not identify with their gender confirm this statement after puberty. Suspending or preventing psychosexual development while waiting for the maturation and definition of the child’s stable identity is in contradiction with the fact that this development is a central factor in the process of identity definition.”

Read the rest of the news piece here.