The WHO said 21 experts will meet in Geneva next month to work on the guide
The World Health Organisation is set to call for people to have the right to self-identify as the opposite sex in its first global guide to transgender care.
The UN agency has been accused of choosing a group of ‘blatantly biased’ activists and medics to develop its guidance on improving access to ‘quality and respectful health services by trans and gender diverse people’.
The WHO said 21 experts will meet at its headquarters in Geneva next month to work on the guide, which will focus on the ‘provision of gender-affirming care, including hormones’ and also ‘legal recognition of self-determined gender identity’.
But it is already facing criticism as many of the group’s members are trans activists and medics who work on ‘affirming’ healthcare.
The group does not include any of the growing number of professionals who have raised concerns about the impact of puberty-blocking drugs on young people.
The WHO’s biographies of the Guideline Development Group state that one member, Ayouba El Hamri, ‘is a trans and feminist activist based in Morocco’ while Florence Ashley ‘is a transfeminine jurist and bioethicist’ and Yanyan Araña is ‘an empowered transgender woman’ who advocates for ‘the inclusivity and accessibility of sexual, reproductive, and transgender health care for the transgender community in the Philippines’.
One of the group who is based in the UK, Dr Walter Bouman, was president of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health and his clinical practice ‘involves prescribing, dosing and monitoring of gender affirming hormone treatment, providing referrals for gender affirming surgeries and other gender affirming medical interventions (hair removal, speech and language therapy) and providing psychological support for trans people’.
Last night Helen Joyce from campaign group Sex Matters said: ‘The WHO has chosen a blatantly biased global expert group to write this draft guidance on treating trans-identified people. Almost all its members are known to support medical interventions for gender distress that have no evidence of efficacy, and growing evidence of harm.
‘This is part of a disturbing pattern worldwide, in which trans healthcare guidance and programmes are written by small, ideologically driven groups behind closed doors, and then presented as definitive.
‘The WHO should abandon its current draft and start over with a panel of genuine experts. The scientific evidence on risks and outcomes should be assessed rigorously and impartially, not through the lens of trans dogma, as it would be with any other public health issue.’
A petition has already been signed by 1,800 people calling on the WHO to ‘go back to the drawing board’.
It states: ‘The current panel is highly biased in favour of ‘gender-affirming’ approaches, with an absence of critical perspectives.
‘The majority of the panel members have expressed strong views in favour of hormonal and surgical interventions for transition, dismissed known and potential risks associated with these interventions, and denigrated psychotherapeutic approaches as ‘conversion therapy’.’
The petition adds that the panel does not include any experts in child and adolescent development, nor anyone who has detransitioned or stops their transition.
It comes after the Mail revealed the UK Government is considering closing a ‘major loophole’ that effectively allows ‘self-ID by the back door’.
The loophole has allowed hundreds to change the sex recorded on their passport using only a medical letter as evidence.
Hounded, MP who dared to speak out for women
A senior Labour MP has been accused of ‘toxic’, ‘evil’ and ‘hateful’ transphobia – simply for daring to speak out in favour of women’s rights.
Tonia Antoniazzi, an opposition whip, posted on social media the statement: ‘Female single-sex spaces are not yours to give away.’
It sparked a huge backlash from many within her party including councillors and local branch officials, who accused her of being anti transgender.
But others said her comment should not be seen as contentious and pointed out that Labour’s own official policy is to support single-sex spaces.
Ms Antoniazzi, MP for Gower in Wales since 2017, was defended by fellow Labour MP Rosie Duffield, who has also been accused of anti-trans hate and been shouted down by her own side in the Commons.
‘Just in case of any doubt, I stand with Tonia, my good friend and strong feminist sister,’ Ms Duffield wrote on Twitter/X.
‘And just for the record, Tonia is a current Labour whip and former Shadow Minister, rightly understanding and expressing the views of most people who vote in the UK.’
And Helen Joyce of campaign group Sex Matters said: ‘The reaction from young Labour activists to a sitting MP simply stating Labour policy on women’s rights and single-sex spaces reveals the extent to which extremist trans ideology has become entrenched in the party.’
She called on party leader Sir Keir Starmer to defend his under-fire colleague. ‘He needs to state, publicly and unequivocally, that the Labour leadership agrees with Ms Antoniazzi: single-sex spaces are crucial to women’s rights, and that is non-negotiable.’
The row illustrates the difficult task Sir Keir faces on the divisive topic of gender ideology.
Last year [2023] he abandoned the policy of allowing anyone to ‘self-identify’ as the opposite sex and backtracked after being ridiculed for saying some women have a penis.
But many Labour activists including some MPs and members of his shadow cabinet want him to speak out more in favour of trans rights.
Among the most vocal critics of Ms Antoniazzi’s post was Councillor Meg Birchall, who said: ‘Transphobes are not fit to be MPs. If you can’t stand up for the rights of your vulnerable constituents you have due to online radicalisation, what will you stand up for?
‘Bigotry never wins in the end and history will view all the MPs spewing this hateful rhetoric as nothing short of evil.’
Councillor Erin Hall said: ‘This is never ever ever okay. I am devastated that this party has fostered an environment where posting intentionally inflammatory transphobia is okay and goes without repercussion. If you can’t bring yourself to stand for trans constituents then you’re not fit to be an MP.’
Jake Swinburne, communications officer for Lincoln Constituency Labour Party (CLP), said: ‘No Labour MP should ever post such toxic bile, we have to hold ourselves to the same standards that we’d hold Tory MPs to, solidarity with our trans siblings.
‘Those who defend dog whistle politics are either genuinely brainwashed or deliberately acting in bad faith, either way, you can’t call yourself a true progressive. You are deliberately stamping on one of the most vulnerable minorities in Britain.’
Jack Bellingham, treasurer of Selby CLP, said: ‘MPs keep promoting this harmful rhetoric about trans people without any repercussion. Our Party shouldn’t be a place for this hate, and the leadership needs to be taking action on it.’
