High Court rejects challenge to puberty blockers trial

The High Court has rejected a legal challenge to an NHS trial examining healthcare for young trans people, heading off the latest attack from anti-trans activists on this vulnerable community.

Just before the general election in 2024, the Tories rushed through a ban on the prescription of puberty blockers to young trans people – a ban made permanent by Wes Streeting after Labour took power. But the Cass Review recommended a clinical trial to examine the evidence.

The controversial Bayswater Support Group teamed up with claimants including Keira Bell, whose legal challenge to young trans healthcare in 2020 was overturned on appeal (PDF), following an intervention by Good Law Project. In a case funded by a group with links to the far right, they asked the High Court for permission to challenge the NHS Pathways trial.

The claimants argued that the decision to approve the trial was unlawful, and posed a risk to young people. They suggested that the medicine should be tested on adults instead – even though puberty blockers remain a standard treatment (PDF) for young trans people across the world.

But the High Court has now rejected that challenge, holding that none of the claimants’ grounds are arguable with a realistic prospect of success. 

The court held that the trial was “commissioned by NHS England with conspicuous care”, that the MHRA, the medicines regulator, undertook a “rigorous process” before approving it, and that each child involved in the trial will have been assessed for many months by specialist doctors as likely to receive direct benefit from the treatment.

The judge also noted that the court must be “very cautious” about interfering with medical regulatory decisions.

Good Law Project has been preparing to support the trans youth charity Gendered Intelligence with an application to intervene, if permission had been granted.

Gendered Intelligence said they were “glad to hear that clinical trials of safe, effective gender care will be able to continue without interference. We should always put our young people first, and always put healthcare before politics.”

According to Good Law Project solicitor Zoe Johannes, this is a “significant win” for young trans people. 

“The arguments made by the claimants weren’t really rooted in concerns about ethics, safety, or efficacy,”  Johannes said. “This is an ideological attack on healthcare for young trans people. But decisions about healthcare should be made by young trans people and their clinicians – not by anti-trans campaigners.”

The claimants may appeal the decision to refuse permission. If that appeal is granted, we stand ready to support Gendered Intelligence to intervene.