Top transgender doctor warns teen treatment ban could be deadly

Senate Bill 514 would ban gender-transition treatment or therapies – even reversible or temporary ones – for anyone under the age of 21.

Dr. Deanna Wilson Adkins is director of Child and Adolescent Gender Care at the Duke University School of Medicine. She's a pediatric endocrinologist with about 400 patients in her group. When she saw the bill that was filed, she said they were her first thought.

"To have to stop care right in the middle of treatment is going to be really devastating for them. It can really destabilize mood and potentially even trigger some suicidality, which is very scary for me," Adkins told WRAL News.

Adkins says the bill is riddled with falsehoods and bad data. She says most minors with gender dysphoria don't need or qualify for treatment with "gender-affirming" or cross-sex hormones.

When minors do receive such treatment, which is reversible, Adkins says, the decision is made not just by the minor, but by a team of medical experts, mental health experts, the patient and the family or guardian. No decision is made until after months of intensive therapy and assessment.

For minors, Adkins says, irreversible changes like surgery are "very, very rare" under the international standard of care for such patients. Counter to what the bill asserts, she says there's "much, much data in our literature" showing that treatment improves outcomes and reduces suicide rates among transgender teens.

"They're trying to promote fear into people that we are providing therapies that are injuring people, when, in actuality, it's life-saving treatment," Adkins said. "It's huge."

Adkins said she also worries about the bill’s requirement that teachers or school staff notify parents in writing if a child is acting in ways that don’t seem to match their biological sex. Many LGBTQ students may not be out to their families, she said.

"That could likely lead to death of many kids, and there are many kids whose families would rather them not be there and would abuse them," Adkins warned. "Based on finding that information out, it definitely is going to impair safety for a lot of kids."

The bill's sponsors – Sens. Ralph Hise, R-Mitchell, Warren Daniel, R-Burke, and Norman Sanderson, R-Pamlico – also filed Senate Bill 515, which would allow health care workers, from nursing home aides to surgeons, to refuse to provide care, information or service to anyone they believe to be LGBTQ, based on "objection of conscience."

Adkins says that, even if neither bill becomes law, the damage is already being done by the rhetoric.

"I have had many patients reach out to me with concern that their care is going to be interrupted, that they're not going to be able to live in their affirmed identity and that their lives are going well now but what's going to happen next?" Adkins said. "It seems to be an opportunity for people to once again victimize transgender youth."

"This bill is also talking about controlling the lives of people who are under 21," she added. "We're not just talking about people who are under 18. These are adults that have made decisions about their own health care."

WRAL News contacted the three bill sponsors, as well as the office of Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger, twice Friday to relay the doctor's warnings and to ask them if they had concerns about the dangers the bills could pose to LGBTQ youths. None responded.