House Education and Workforce Committee chair Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC) is demanding answers from a St. Louis gender clinic regarding its administration of “life-altering medical interventions” to children.
In a letter to hospital president Trish Lollo obtained exclusively by Breitbart News, Foxx identifies significant concerns regarding parental involvement and notification.
“The family is the most basic unit of society and as such, ‘parents have the inalienable right and responsibility to educate and rear their children,’” Foxx wrote. “Unfortunately, there are people who want to override parents’ decisions. Their efforts result in the erosion of parents’ rights to make medical decisions for their children.”
Foxx cites recent whistleblower testimony from Jamie Reed, a former employee of the Washington University Transgender Center at the St. Louis Children’s Hospital, detailing the clinic’s preference for “gender affirmation” treatment even when opposed to the wishes of parents.
“‘My concerns about … [the] approach to dissenting parents grew in 2019 when one of our doctors actually testified in a custody hearing against a father who opposed a mother’s wish to start their 11 year-old daughter on puberty blockers,’” the letter states.
“This employee went on to state, ‘The doctors I worked alongside at the Transgender Center said frequently about the treatment of our patients: ‘We are building the plane while we are flying it.’”
Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-VA) hands out pocket-sized copies of the U.S. Constitution during an event to introduce the Parents Bill of Rights Act in the Rayburn Room at the U.S. Capitol on March 01, 2023 in Washington, DC. According to the Speaker’s office, “the Parents Bill of Rights was designed to empower parents and ensure that they are able to be involved in their kids’ education.” (Chip Somodevilla/Getty)
Parental rights and their ability to be informed of their children’s medical information has been a significant issue, particularly in schools, with administrators often aiding in the “social transitioning” of students without parental knowledge or consent.
As Breitbart News reported, the same gender clinic encouraged local fifth grade school teachers to “affirm” the “transgender” identity of an entire group of children.
Foxx detailed several instances of governmental power being wielded against parents in the pursuit of gender transition.
“Parents’ rights are being further eroded by the courts or state agencies,” the letter stated. “Child protective services (“CPS”) has taken children from the homes of loving parents because such parents do not support irreversible, life-altering surgeries and other medical interventions, such as cross-sex hormones, on their children diagnosed with gender dysphoria.”
Foxx cited the case of California mother Abigail Martinez, whose children were taken out of her custody and who was permitted a mere hour of visitation per week with her children because Martinez did not want her children to undergo the child “transition” procedures.
Likewise, Illinois mother Jeannette Cooper lost a custody battle with her ex-husband because of their daughter’s insistence on receiving the gender interventions.
Representative Virginia Foxx (R) attends the first session of the 118th Congress in the House Chamber in Washington, DC, US, on Tuesday, January 3, 2023. (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty)
“Your hospital’s website touts the role it plays in delivering ‘gender affirming’ medical interventions, noting your mission is ‘to provide all-encompassing care to kids and young adults who identify as transgender, gender non-conforming, non-binary or genderqueer,’” Foxx’s letter states, citing the hospital. “It further states, ‘Beginning at age 12, all patients will have a private, confidential conversation with a Transgender Center team member,’ and that ‘[f]or patients younger than 18, parents are included for as much of the medical visit as possible.’”
“No explanation is given of what criteria, if any, are used to make determinations about the inclusion of parents ‘for as much of the medical visit as possible.’”
Those criteria were a significant point of focus for Reed as she was “struck by the lack of formal protocols for treatment,” and detailed how only very little evidence is required to start children down the irreversible path of “gender transition.”
“Parents have the right and responsibility to make medical decisions for their children, and they should be free to do so without undue pressure or interference from medical establishments,” Foxx stated.
The North Carolina Republican is demanding answers on several aspects of the clinic’s protocols regarding parents and how children start down the path of “transition,” including interventions on vaginoplasty, phalloplasty, chest reconstruction, breast augmentation, facial feminization, or facial masculinization”:
- Has St. Louis Children’s Hospital ever delivered medical interventions for a minor diagnosed with gender dysphoria whose parents have objected to such interventions?
- Has St. Louis Children’s Hospital ever provided a vaginoplasty, metoidioplasty, phalloplasty, chest reconstruction, breast augmentation, facial feminization, or facial masculinization to a child over the objection of one or both parents?
- Please provide a summary of the policies and protocol(s) used to consult with parents when parents of minors, or minors themselves, contact the hospital for services related to a possible gender dysphoria diagnosis or a desire for “gender affirming” care. Please include a copy of the consent form(s) used for such services (including for puberty blockers, estrogen or feminizing medications, testosterone or masculinizing medications, progesterone or other progestogens, and surgeries), the timing or juncture at which consent is obtained, including whether consent is obtained anew before escalating to a new treatment phase (for example, if clinicians recommend the introduction of cross-sex hormones to a child currently receiving GnRHA treatments), and please note whether each form is for the child, parent, or both.
- Please list how many, if any, reports or inquiries hospital staff have made to child protective services regarding a child presenting for, or currently receiving, “gender affirming” care.
- Please list how many, if any, reports or inquiries hospital staff have made to CPS in response to a parent (or parents) who will not consent to medical interventions that would hormonally or surgically transition his or her child.
- Please describe the hospital’s process for handling a case if parents do not agree with a doctor’s recommended plan of care for their child diagnosed with gender dysphoria. Please also describe the hospital’s process for handling a case in which two parents share custody of their child, but only one parent agrees with a doctor’s recommended plan of care for his or her child diagnosed with gender dysphoria.
- Please describe the hospital’s process for handling a case if a parent refuses (or both parents refuse) to consent to medical or surgical interventions for purposes of gender transition desired by the child and/or recommended by the child’s care providers.
- Please describe the minimum number of mental health assessments and/or mental health therapy sessions the hospital requires a child to receive prior to undergoing medical or surgical interventions for purposes of gender transition. Also, please specify what types of clinicians are assessing and treating the patients (for example, licensed psychiatrists, psychologists, clinical social workers, behavioral health technicians, etc.) Are all the children and adolescents diagnosed with gender dysphoria diagnosed by either a licensed psychiatrist or psychologist, or are there other types of clinicians making the diagnoses? Please also specify whether such therapy sessions involve parents and, if so, what type of involvement with parents is required. For example, are parents required to consent to therapy sessions, to attend therapy sessions, to participate in family therapy sessions with the child, or to agree with or consent to a therapists’ referral of the child for medical or surgical interventions before such interventions are performed?
- Please provide the number of children you have seen at your hospital (including the Transgender Center) who have received cross-sex hormones from the hospital, the number who have received puberty blockers from the hospital, and the number who have obtained the surgeries listed above at the hospital. Additionally, please provide the number of children for whom the hospital, including the Transgender Center, has provided referrals to obtain cross-sex hormones, and referrals for vaginoplasty, metoidioplasty, phalloplasty, chest reconstruction, breast augmentation, facial feminization, or facial masculinization. Please include at what age each child in each of these categories has been given the referrals.
- Please provide the number of children assessed for, diagnosed with, or treated for gender dysphoria by the hospital (including those seen in the Transgender Center and those seen by other departments and assessed for, diagnosed with, or treated for gender dysphoria or referred for “gender affirming” treatments) who are under the ward of the state or under the guardianship of someone other than their parent(s). Please provide the number of children you have seen at your hospital whose parents both granted consent to their child’s treatment at your hospital, the number of children you have seen where one parent granted consent to his or her child’s treatment over the objection of the other parent, the number of children you have seen in which consent was obtained due to court intervention, and the number of children you have seen for whom another guardian not listed here granted consent for the treatment.
Foxx gave the hospital 14 days to respond to her letter.
Read the letter here:
Foxx Letter To St Louis Chi… by Breitbart News
Breccan F. Thies is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow him on Twitter @BreccanFThies.
