Child Medicine Organizations Fight Over Transgenderism

A nurse administers a pediatric dose of the COVID-19 vaccine to a girl at a L.A. Care Health Plan vaccination clinic at Los Angeles Mission College in Los Angeles, Calif., on Jan. 19, 2022. Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images

The American College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) has condemned its liberal counterpart, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) because of the second’s support for transgenderism.

The AAP is one of America’s largest child medicine groups, with over 67,000 member pediatricians.

The AAP has promoted drugs, cross-sex hormones, and surgery for children who claim to be transgender. According to documents leaked by a whistleblower, many AAP pediatricians oppose these methods because there is no high-quality long-term evidence that they help.

“In recent years, the AAP has been moving more toward radical ideology in its treatment of matters related to sexuality, gender, and abortion,” the press release from ACPeds reads.

Moreover, the AAP changed its rules to block a member-drafted resolution to review its policies that recommended child cross-sex hormones and sex change surgeries, ACPeds said.

The resolution notes that “no clear diagnostic criteria exist which can reliably identify which young people will persist in a transgender identification and there is increasing evidence of regret and detransition.”

It recommends that the AAP conduct a “rigorous systematic review” of its policy on transgender issues.

Gender Confusion

Eighty percent of the AAP’s voting members approved the resolution, the ACPeds press release said, but the AAP leadership still buried it.

“We denounce the ideology push from the AAP because it violates the fundamental purpose of both science and medicine: to follow methodical and logical processes, to heal and first, do no harm,” wrote Quentin Van Meter, president and co-executive director of ACPeds.

He went on to call the AAP “ideologues, not scientist physicians.”

Van Meter further added that the Endocrine Society, the Pediatric Endocrine Society, the American Psychological Association, and others had also advocated for transgender ideology.

Transgender activists gather in protest in Los Angeles, Calif., on Oct. 10, 2021. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

Child transgenderism also has support from the CDC, the Mayo Clinic, the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, and other important medical institutions.

According to its website, the AAP was founded in 1930 to serve as an independent forum for child health discussions.

According to its website, the ACPeds started in 2002 to create a pediatric organization that wouldn’t be influenced by political movements.

The AAP’s continued support for transgender surgery comes at a time when the United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland, and France have all pulled back on supporting transgenderism.

“It would be fallacious to claim that these European nations represent either politically conservative or religious strongholds. They don’t,” said Andre van Mol, the co-chair of ACPeds’ Council on Adolescent Sexuality.

The Response

The Epoch Times reached out to the AAP, and received a reply from Lisa Black, the group’s media relations manager. Black said she was not a spokesperson for the AAP. She also said that the AAP does not promote cross-sex hormone use or sex change surgery for children.

The AAP’s policy guidelines, which Black linked to in the email, state that the AAP recommends that insurers offer coverage for transgender and gender diverse (TGD) youth including “medical, psychological, and, when indicated, surgical gender-affirming interventions.”

The guidelines also state, “Gender affirmation among adolescents with gender dysphoria often reduces the emphasis on gender in their lives, allowing them to attend to other developmental tasks, such as academic success, relationship building, and future-oriented planning.”

Black also said that the AAP didn’t change its rules to block a member-drafted resolution to review its policies on transgender children.

The AAP also said the resolution to review transgender policies didn’t advance because most of its membership disagreed with it.

AAP’s president, Dr. Moira Szilagyi, said a resolution isn’t needed to prompt a review of the evidence on care for transgender youth because that is a “routine part of the Academy’s policy-writing process.”

Finally, Black said that 80 percent of the AAP’s membership didn’t approve the resolution.

Correction: A previous version of this article included the wrong title for the The American College of Pediatricians. The Epoch Times regrets the error.