Finland’s Major Studies Challenge Claims That Gender-Affirming Care Improves Mental Health

Two important studies from Finland have just given us the clearest picture yet of what really happens to young people who feel distressed about their gender. The researchers looked at every single teenager and young adult in the whole country who went to a special gender clinic between 1996 and 2019. That’s 2,083 young people in total.

These studies used official national health records (not surveys or opinions) and compared the young people to 16,643 regular kids from the general population who were the same age and grew up in the same areas. The results are powerful because they track real-life outcomes over many years – up to 25 years in some cases.

Here’s what they found

The Two Studies (Same Group of Young People)

2026 Study (published in April 2026): Focused on how much specialist mental-health care the young people needed before and after going to the gender clinic.
2024 Study: Focused on suicide rates and overall death rates.

Both studies looked at the same 2,083 young people:

About 41% were born male.
Most of the big increase in referrals happened after 2010, and most of those were girls (born female).
38% (796 young people) went on to receive medical gender treatments (cross-sex hormones and/or surgery – called “medical gender reassignment” or GR in the studies).
62% (1,287 young people) did not receive any medical treatments.

2026 Study: Mental-Health Treatment Needs Skyrocketed or Stayed Extremely High

The researchers counted how many young people needed specialist psychiatric care (real hospital-level mental-health services for serious issues like depression, anxiety, trauma, or other conditions).

Here are the exact numbers for those who did get medical treatments:

Group	Before first clinic visit	2+ years after first clinic visit	Change
Born-male group who got medical GR	9.8%	60.7%	Huge jump
Born-female group who got medical GR	21.6%	54.5%	Big jump

For the much larger group who did NOT get medical treatments:

Before clinic: 60.2% already needed specialist mental-health care.
2+ years later: 63.4% (still extremely high).

Overall, the entire group of 2,083 gender-clinic patients went from 45.7% needing specialist mental-health care before their first visit to 61.7% afterwards.

The regular kids in the comparison group stayed steady at around 14–15%.

Even when the researchers adjusted for the fact that many already had mental-health problems before the clinic, the gender-clinic patients still had 3 to 6 times higher risk of needing ongoing specialist care than regular kids – whether they got medical treatments or not.

The researchers’ own words:

“Severe psychiatric problems are common among these young people … Psychiatric needs do not subside after medical gender reassignment.”

2024 Study: Suicide Rates

Suicide is rare, but it is a serious concern. In the whole group of 2,083 gender-clinic patients, the suicide rate was 0.3% (very low in actual numbers).

At first glance it looked about 4 times higher than in regular kids. But once the researchers took into account the young people’s past mental-health problems, the difference disappeared. There was no statistically significant difference in suicide rates compared to regular kids.

Importantly:

There was no difference in suicide rates between the young people who got medical gender treatments and those who did not.
The main driver of suicide risk was the other serious mental-health issues – not the gender distress itself and not whether they received hormones or surgery.

The researchers’ own words:

“Medical gender reassignment does not have an impact on suicide risk.”

Side-by-Side Summary (Both Studies)

What was measured	Young people who got medical GR	Young people who did NOT get medical GR	Regular kids (comparison group)
Mental-health service use (2026)	Big increase after treatment	Already very high, stayed very high	Low and stable
Suicide rates (2024)	No improvement	Same as the GR group	No difference after adjustment

Why These Studies Matter So Much

They include every young person who sought help in Finland – no one was left out.
They use official government health records, so the data are factual and complete.
They followed people for a long time.
They compared them to ordinary young people of the same age and background.
The same team of doctors ran Finland’s gender clinics for decades, so they know these patients personally.

What Finland Itself Decided

Because of these kinds of findings, Finland changed its national guidelines in 2020. They now say the first and main treatment for gender-distressed young people should be psychological support, therapy, and proper treatment of other mental-health issues. Medical treatments (hormones and surgery) are not offered routinely and are only considered in very carefully assessed cases.

What This Means for Policy

These studies show that giving medical gender treatments to minors is not the answer. The vast majority of these young people arrive at the clinic with very serious mental-health problems that existed before any gender treatment. Medical interventions do not fix those problems – and for those who receive them, the need for mental-health care often gets even worse.

We must protect children and teenagers by:

Stopping all medical gender treatments (puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries) for anyone under 18.
Prioritising thorough mental-health assessments and evidence-based psychological therapy first.
Expanding proper mental-health services for young people dealing with distress, trauma, autism, depression, and other issues.
Requiring long-term, independent follow-up using real health records.

The evidence is clear. Our children deserve real help – not medical experiments. Let’s act on what the data actually shows.

References:

BMJ Ment Health 2024 Feb 17, All-cause and suicide mortalities among adolescents and young adults who contacted specialised gender identity services in Finland in 1996-2019: a register study – https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38367979

Acta Paediatrica 2026 April 04, Psychiatric Morbidity Among Adolescents and Young Adults Who Contacted Specialised Gender Identity Services in Finland in 1996–2019: A Register Study –https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/apa.70533