A 2023 study shows puberty blockers cause lasting bone density loss
Tom Swarbrick said:
“Individuals assigned male at birth who began puberty blockers and later took oestrogen continue to show, quote, persistently reduced spinal bone density in their late twenties, indicating potential long term future”
Citing a named journal and a specific year gives the impression of solid, recent scientific evidence. Bone density is a concrete, measurable outcome, and the phrase 'persistently reduced' sounds alarming and definitive.
Bone density during puberty suppression is a genuinely monitored area of medicine, and that monitoring exists because clinicians take it seriously, not because the answer is already settled against treatment. What the research actually shows is more complicated than any single finding: observational data from a small sample, with no control group, tells us something worth watching and something worth investigating further, not something worth using as a final verdict. The studies that exist vary in design, follow-up period and sample size, and the broader literature, including data from people who have used blockers for precocious puberty for decades, does not support the picture of inevitable long-term harm. Young people and their families who hear one number, stripped of that context, may turn away from a treatment that, with proper clinical monitoring, was the right choice for them.
What I said at the time:
“What you need to do, Tom, when you're going to pick out and cherry pick the research, we've to be really careful we don't do that, is we need to look at peer reviewed reviews of multiple research.”
Young people and parents who are frightened away from a treatment that, with appropriate monitoring, may be the right clinical choice for them.