Posted on Sunday, October 27, 2024

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Republican lawmakers are launching an investigation into the withholding of data from a government-funded study on the effects of gender-related medical treatments for minors, National Review has learned.

“This is a clear example of the politicization of science at the expense of children. Research funded by taxpayer dollars through the National Institutes of Health should be publicly disclosed regardless of the results, and Americans deserve access to the truth,” said Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R., Wash.), who serves as the chairwoman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. “For a scientist to withhold findings deliberately because the findings don’t substantiate a preferred outcome further erodes public trust in the NIH and its programs. Our Committee will be launching an investigation into the matter.”

Johanna Olson-Kennedy, the medical director of the Center for Transyouth Health and Development at the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles, began leading a study in 2015 on the effects of so-called gender-affirming care in adolescents. The National Institutes of Health awarded the researchers $5.7 million in 2015, and the broader project has reportedly received nearly $10 million in government funding in the nine years since. As part of the study, the researchers followed 95 adolescents — averaging age eleven — who received puberty-blocking drugs for two years.

In a recent interview with the New York Times, Olson-Kennedy said that the drugs did not lead to improvements in mental health and argued that the children had been doing well before the medical treatments. She stated, “They’re in really good shape when they come in, and they’re in really good shape after two years.” That explanation, however, seems to contradict a 2020 paper by the researchers that said nearly a quarter of the children in the cohort endorsed lifetime suicidal ideation prior to receiving the puberty-blocking drugs.

Olson-Kennedy and her team are currently withholding the data from the nine-year project because of political considerations. She expressed worries to the New York Times that the study’s findings might be “weaponized” to support legal bans on gender-related treatments for children. Olson-Kennedy “was concerned the study’s results could be used in court to argue that ‘we shouldn’t use [puberty] blockers’” as medical treatment for minors, according to the Times.

“Delaying the publication of clinical trial studies, funded in part by the federal government, for fear that its findings would be ‘weaponized’ by those who are opposed to invasive transgender procedures in juveniles is irresponsible and inappropriate,” Morgan Griffith, a Republican representative from Virginia and chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, told National Review. “The American people should be allowed to follow the science even when it leads to a conclusion that the scientist doing the study doesn’t like.”

Several Republicans in Congress called on the National Institutes of Health to release the data. 

“Puberty blockers and sex-change operations harm children, period. It’s outrageous for taxpayer-funded research to be hidden from the public, especially when it is being suppressed by a transgender advocate simply because the findings don’t fit their political agenda,” Republican representative Diana Harshbarger of Tennessee told National Review. “This is a glaring example of why NIH must be reformed with measures like those initiated by Chair Rodgers to ensure transparency, standards of objectivity, and the removal of conflicts of interest in federal taxpayer-funded scientific and medical research. The NIH must release the results of this taxpayer-funded study immediately.”

Brett Guthrie, a Republican representative from Kentucky and chairman of the Subcommittee on Health, said that the study is a “great example” of why Congress and the American people are demanding more transparency and accountability from the public-health institutions. 

“Not publishing the results of taxpayer-funded research in fear of political blowback not only further erodes trust in our public health institutions, but also fundamentally undermines the very nature of scientific research,” Guthrie wrote to National Review. “Most importantly, failing to publish these results to protect one’s own political agenda puts vulnerable children at risk of serious self-harm.”

Guthrie further called on the National Institutes of Health to immediately suspend funding for the study and publish the results.

According to a National Institutes of Health website, the research team led by Olson-Kennedy received more than $950,000 in government funding for the year 2023 alone. 

“By receiving nearly $10 million in taxpayer dollars, Dr. Olson-Kennedy is no longer only bound by her commitment to scientific inquiry, she now owes the taxpayer a return on their investment,” Robert Aderholt, a Republican representative from Alabama, told National Review. “By not publishing the results of her study, Dr. Olson-Kennedy is proving that the left loves to say ‘Follow the science,’ but when that science doesn’t back up their point of view, they will gladly try to hide it.”

Olson-Kennedy is the president-elect of the United States Professional Association for Transgender Health and, according to a court document from 2023, has “provided services for approximately 1,200 young people and their families.” Olson-Kennedy co-authored a study published in 2018 comparing females with gender dysphoria aged 13 to 25 who had undergone “chest reconstruction surgery” (a mastectomy) with those who had not undergone such surgery and concluded that “chest reconstruction had a positive effect both transmasculine minors and young adults.” At a symposium, Olson-Kennedy defended the surgeries for minors and stated, “Here’s the other thing about chest surgery: If you want breasts at a later point in your life, you can go and get them!”

“They are covering up this study because it proves what anyone with a brain already knows: Sterilizing children is harmful,” Republican senator Ted Cruz of Texas told National Review, adding that “pseudoscientific chemical-castration experiments don’t work, and children are being harmed by the left’s woke ideology.” Senator Cruz further stated that his opponent in Texas, Colin Allred, is a “champion for these procedures that hurt children.”

Olson-Kennedy did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication. 

Reprinted with permission from National Review by Abigail Anthony.

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.