The crusade against puberty blocking drugs, the therapies prescribed to transgender adolescents to stop (reversibly) the physical changes linked to puberty, such as the development of breasts or beards, also begins in Lombardy. The League has presented a motion in the Lombardy Regional Council to ask for a ban on triptorelin, the most used blockade in this area, currently prescribed only after a careful multidisciplinary evaluation at specialized medical centers. «It is mainly used in the treatment of symptoms of prostate cancer, in breast cancer where hormonal treatment is indicated and in premenopausal patients. But it can also delay the pubertal development of children who suffer from gender dysphoria and therefore do not accept their birth sex”, we read in the premises of the motion. «In the specific case of gender dysphoria, Triptorelin is used to suspend pubertal development, even if its use is considered off label, i.e. outside the specific therapeutic indications of the drug», continues Carroccio. And remember that since 2019 AIFA has included this therapy among the drugs that can be paid for by the National Health Service for cases with “diagnosis of gender dysphoria”.
The effectiveness of the drug on gender incongruence
The League then underlines that «it has not yet been clarified whether the temporary block of physical development alone, in an adolescent with dysphoria, can actually constitute a “favorable” condition for the resolution of his identity conflict». However, it should be remembered that in recent months 12 specialized scientific societies in the sector – from endocrinologists to andrologists to child neuropsychiatrists – have written a letter to clarify the issue, highlighting the effectiveness and importance of these therapies. It is, the experts highlighted, “a life-saving drug. According to the data available to date, in fact, up to 40% of transgender adolescents attempt suicide (see James SE, et al. National Center for Transgender Equality. 2016), and therapy with triptorelin reduces this possibility by 70% (see . Turban JL et al.
The gaffe in the motion
For its part, the League supports its request with a series of statements from alleged biologists and scientists. Presumed because whoever wrote and published the motion forgot to include the name and surname of the experts, which remained simply “XX”. An oversight, and a gaffe.
The requests of the League
Hence the League’s requests to the Regional Council to activate a ministerial table of technicians and experts to develop new guidelines on the use of triptorelin in cases of gender dysphoria and a survey of the Regions on the expenditure and prescriptions of triptorelin in trans teenagers. Not only. They ask for an in-depth report from AIFA on the consequences of the drug, a change to the law that allows the provision to be paid for by the NHS and – in the meantime – to “ban the prescription of triptorelin in Lombardy in all cases not covered by the product sheet issued from the pharmaceutical company.”
