Biden’s HHS Is Quietly Funding Research on the Effects of Sex Change Treatments

By Hudson Crozier

What’s happening: President Joe Biden’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is funding over $26 million in transgender-related research with universities and medical centers across the country. Much of it focuses on the effects of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for the purpose of gender transition.

Why it matters: The Biden administration has aggressively fought to expand access to sex changes, including for children, through executive orders, taxpayer funding, legal action against states, and even a failed attempt to force Christian doctors to perform sex changes against their will. From a scientific standpoint, Biden’s HHS has referred to transitioning children as “evidence-based” and “crucial” and claimed that “there is no debate in the medical community about the medical or scientific validity of gender-affirming care.” Yet with this research funding, the administration acknowledges concerns and uncertainty.

Some of the research topics: The HHS will examine whether cross-sex hormones cause bone loss and infertility, how they affect a child’s developing brain, and if they increase the risk of heart attack, stroke, thrombosis, sexually transmitted infection, and drug overdose. It will also look at how puberty blockers affect bone health, as well as “anxiety, depression, and health-related quality of life.” The HHS repeatedly acknowledges a lack of existing research to support these treatments, though they’re already widely used on children.

Big picture: Biden’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and other world governments have warned of the harmful effects and experimental nature of these treatments, and medical data supporting them are overwhelmingly flawed. Still, America is more in favor of sex changes than most of the world, though some states are pushing back.