Opinion by Des Houghton
The United Nations has demanded Queensland’s Premier explain child safety measures at a hospital gender clinic after a psychiatrist’s controversial suspension, writes Des Houghton.
It is time for the Queensland Government to admit that the sacking of child psychiatrist Jillian Spencer by Queensland Health was gut-wrenching injustice. Her “crime” was to be a voice of reason.
Dr Spencer first pointed out the dangers of puberty blockers and sex-change hormones in 2022 and has subsequently been vindicated by evidence gathered by medical tribunals and courts around the globe.
And now the United Nations has warned the actions against Spencer will have “chilling effect” on free speech and would discourage other doctors from speaking out about malpractice in our hospitals.
Ms Reem Alsalem, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Violence against women girls is demanding answers.
Premier David Crisafulli, his Health Minister Tim Nicholls and their Director-General of Health Dr David Rosengren would now be wise to cease the lawfare against Spencer and reinstate her. A negotiated settlement would be fair and honourable. In fact it would be unethical not to find a solution.
The Premier needs to show some leadership and admit the state got it wrong.
For Spencer, the process has been the punishment. She has suffered enough.
Her sacking highlights the troubling trend of ideological enforcement and the suppression of dissenting professional expert voices.
Understand that this is no longer a health issue, Mr Premier. It has transformed into a political and industrial one. It is now a test of your political judgement.
It is not too late to prevent what many will see as a miscarriage of justice on your watch.
If Crisafulli and Nicholls do not have the courage to close the transgender affirmation clinic at the Queensland Children’s Hospital, Dr Rosengren should do so. This is not to say that children suffering gender dysphoria should be treated with anything but kindness and understanding. Their cases could be absorbed into the regular child psychiatric services and not be in the clinic where it’s claimed transgender activism was rampant, according to evidence in affidavits in the Supreme Court and the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission.
From Geneva, Ms Alsalem delivered some powerful words the health bureaucrats and politicians cannot ignore.
She said Dr Spencer’s suspension also “raised concerns about clinical practices concerning children experiencing gender distress, potentially undermining the best interests of the child and adversely affecting the realization of children’s rights under the Convention on the Rights of the Child, including the rights to health and protection from harm”.
She added: “Where the subject of such chilling effects is a woman professional or a woman human rights defender expressing dissenting views on public policy, the measures may further reinforce stereotyping decision-making.”
Spencer’s suspension and the threat of a termination “raises concerns” about possible breaches of under article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Alsalem claimed.
The United Nations’ intervention follow’s last month’s warning by the Crime and Corruption Commission that Dr Spencer may have been stood down unlawfully.
Elizabeth Foulger, a CCC director, said a termination letter sent to Dr Spencer in September last year may have been a reprisal action to prevent her from speaking out about perceived wrongdoing at the hospital
Now the United Nations is demanding the Premier say how he intends to protect children at the hospital’s gender clinic that remains open for business despite adverse study findings against the “affirmation model” practiced there.
Please provide information on the safeguards in place to ensure that policies and clinical practices affecting children and adolescents experiencing gender distress are consistent with the best interests of the child and the rights to health, bodily integrity and protection from harm,” she wrote.
Spencer incurred the wrath of some colleagues by suggesting in interviews that young people complaining of “gender dysphoria” may in fact be suffering from autism spectrum disorder or have hidden traumas or the distress due to family breakdowns, sexual abuse or bullying and exclusion at school.
Other psychiatrists have been reluctant to come forward to Spencer’s defence for good reason.
Queensland psychiatrist Andrew Amos was banned by the Medical Board of Australia and the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency from making online statements about gender and barred from having direct clinical contact with any patients for supporting Spencer.
Dr Amos, a fellow of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists outlined his fears when he called on Queensland Health to reinstate Spencer in an article published in The Courier-Mail bearing my byline.
Amos said Spencer was the target of a political campaign by gender activists.
He also described transgender studies in schools as “absolutely terrible” and likely to confuse vulnerable young people.
And he was critical of the college of psychiatry for not backing Spencer.
“I believe she has been unfairly treated by Queensland Health and I also believe she’s been unfairly treated by the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists,” Dr Amos told me.
If David Crisafulli needs any more convincing he may care to read the evidence given in the British High Court last year by Professor Christopher Gillberg, an expert in child and adolescent psychiatry.
Gillberg said puberty blockers not only caused infertility but harmed a patient’s brain and bone development.
“In all my years as a physician I cannot remember an issue of greater significance for the practice of medicine,” he told the court.
Gillberg’s testimony is reproduced in part in documents before the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission where Queensland psychiatrist Jillian Spencer is challenging Queensland Health’s rejection of her public interest disclosures.
Just like Gillberg, whistleblower Spencer believes puberty blockers and the transgender affirmation model embraced by Queensland Health is dangerous.
Gillberg said internet sites persuade autistic children they are transgender when they simply have “identity issues”.
Spencer, likewise, worries about the pernicious influence of social media.
Source: The Courier Mail
or archive link:
printed edition:
