Listen to Susie Green Discuss the Fight for Trans Youth on ShoutOut Radio
On 2nd January 2025, Susie Green, co-founder of Anne Health, joined ShoutOut Radio to discuss the challenges facing trans youth and their families in the wake of the UK's ban on puberty blockers. At the start of the permanent ban on puberty blockers for trans kids, this timely interview highlights the discriminatory policies impacting life-saving care, the proactive measures Anne Health is taking to provide support, and the urgent need for systemic change. The conversation sheds light on the human cost of these legislative decisions, offering a heartfelt and critical perspective on the current landscape for trans healthcare.
Listen to the recorded segment and read the full transcript below to hear Susie's insights on this crucial issue.
Interview Transcript
Shoutout Radio: I'm joined by Susie Green, who is one of those fighters who got her head well above the parapet. Welcome, welcome to Shout Out, Susie.
Susie Green: Thank you for having me back on again. It's lovely to see you again. So we had this idea that we needed to do something for trans people of all ages, but we just didn't have the means to get it started.
And then, surprisingly, at the beginning of 2024. We had an offer from someone who wanted to support us to be able to start the company up. And so we set up. So we're a nonprofit. We are intending as soon as we possibly can to provide subsidized care for people who can't afford private health care.
And we know that's a big demographic. Graphic of people. But we provide healthcare for trans people of all ages, including trans youth and including puberty blockers.
Shoutout Radio: Ah, the magic word puberty blockers. There's been a right fight not just in this country, but around the planet and a pushback.
We've got some countries that are forward thinking like Spain, Germany. Does it really shock you that when the Cass Report came out and there was talk of puberty blockers and somebody who's gay is now running the NHS and that is a shock because they've turned also against the trans community.
There's so much evidence, years worth of evidence of puberty blockers being given to children and they've disregarded all of that evidence.
Susie Green: Yeah and not just that, there's been some huge takedowns at the Cass Review, but somehow still it's been treated by politicians as this holy grail of information on what should be done for transgender young people.
The fact that the entire community has turned around and said that it's biased, politically motivated report that has been done by somebody who didn't have any access to trans youth and deliberately, stopped anybody who was trans from being part of that team. The fact that those factors, even just those minor factors, should have made people question the origins.
We now know Kemi Badenoch has stated that this was done and the work with putting people into the EHRC, et cetera, those kinds of things were done deliberately to undermine trans rights. And yet still, a new Labour government with whom I'm expect, I expected to actually look at this with maybe a little bit more of a critical eye, have accepted everything that's written in there as if it's, as if it's fact.
And it's got so many issues with the, studies that it refused to acknowledge the members of the team that are on there that we know have got a gender critical viewpoint, the statements that have come out of it, and now following that, the puberty blocker ban that Victoria Atkins put into place before they closed down Parliament, and then the fact that Wes Streeting picked it up and ran with it, and still is.
It's shocking to me, especially when we know that there was a room full of transgender children and their families, eight young people and their parents sat with Wes Streeting and told him how bad the puberty blockers, what puberty blocker ban was, how bad it affected them, their children the negative impact it would have if it was made permanent.
He promised them that he heard them. One mom that I've spoken to who was in that space said it was the most traumatic hour she's ever spent with one young person talking about two of her friends who took their own lives. And he looked them in the eyes and he told them that he heard them. And then he went ahead with the ban anyway. And then he stood in parliament and laughed and joked about what they were doing by extending the ban. And not only doing that, but then also making administration of the blocker to a young person in this country an illegal act making it a supply, which means then that if a parent injects a young person after the 1st of January, they'll be, they would be seen to be supplying the medication as well.
It's not, it's shocking, hugely, massively disappointing, but there's also a huge part of me that just wonders where on earth is this coming from? Where is this hostility against kids and young people for being able to access life affirming, life saving care? What is the problem? And it's only trans kids because precocious puberty is perfectly safe for, and kids have already been on it within the NHS or who were on it before who managed to get an NHS GP to take it forward, it's still safe for them as well.
So there's a huge disconnect in here somewhere. And it's really concerning me. It's hugely prejudicial. But. This is going to kill people. It really is. And for that, he can never be forgiven. Our government, our current government, our current Labour government for allowing this to go into law and to be made permanent and to create this horrible environment that criminalizes parents just for looking after the best interests of their kids.
That can never be forgiven. It's unforgivable.
Shoutout Radio: It is now moving on Susie. You are about to clash with this law. How do you see yourself moving forward now? Are you going to make this a court case?
Susie Green: No, we're not because we think it would need to be a family who have been affected by this that would need to make it a court case.
But So we had legal advice because obviously as soon as the original ban came in we realized that we were going to have to change the way that we were working in terms of how we're operating, particularly for trans youth who needed blockers. So we've got some really good legal advice. And The legal advice that we were given then and now basically points out that there is a legal route for families to take to be able to get access to puberty blockers.
But it just means that everything has to be done outside of the UK. It's a bit like somebody going into, you can't smoke weed here. It's a prohibited drug. It's illegal to do that here. But. You can knowingly get on a plane to go to Amsterdam and go sit in a cafe in Amsterdam and have a smoke and eat some space cake or whatever floats your boat, and that's completely legal because it's entirely outside of UK jurisdiction. Therefore, we're not. telling people to go down an illegal route. We are not telling people that they should break the law. What we're telling them is that we have a way to support them to get access for their kids if they need it.
And, I talked to desperate parents day in, day out whose children are in pieces. And who they're trying to keep alive. And if, they would break the law, I think, many of them, if it came down to it, to protect their kids lives, but what we are doing is we're providing them a way to get the kids the medication that they need that will keep them safe, but to do so in an entirely lawful way.
Shoutout Radio: Does that mean that people will have to go to countries like Spain and Germany for treatment and then come back with their children after they've had the puberty blocker?
Susie Green: So they basically will have to go to a non UK base, so they'll have to travel outside of the UK and Northern Ireland, Wales, Northern Ireland, Scotland, et cetera.
They'll have to travel outside and any administration, the medication will have to be done outside Of the UK as well. And yeah, EU countries are probably the best place best places to facilitate that happening
Shoutout Radio: Is it legal in Southern Ireland.
Susie Green: The Republic of Ireland is still open. So it's still legal in the Republic of Ireland.
So if somebody wanted to hop across to the Republic of Ireland and the medication was both purchased and administered there, that would be legal. But we do expect that the Republic of Ireland will follow Northern Ireland at some point, whether it be a week, two weeks, two months, whatever. So it's a little bit of a dangerous alternative at the moment, but people can still use that route if they want to. We've said to people, it's still open and it's still there as an option. But that they can't bring medication back for their children anymore, which they could before under the terms of the previous ban, which means that they have to go there, get the medication there, administer it there, and then fly back.
That's legal currently. But we expect that to change.
Shoutout Radio: You expect that to change?
Susie Green: In the Republic of Ireland, we believe that the Republic of Ireland will follow Northern Ireland. They generally do. Okay. So we just don't know. We don't know. But that's what our assumption is that the Republic is not a long term prospect, but that it's still open now.
Shoutout Radio: Okay. Do you think there's any possibility that the UK government will try and cover this loophole? Or do you think like other things, like you said, smoking weed, and even going to Switzerland to end your life is outside of the UK and people have been doing that. Obviously, there's a cost involved with those thing.
Is this going to be very costly for parents who are probably struggling?
Susie Green: Yeah, there's just no way around it. It is. It's, and this is the other thing as well. It's again, widening the divide between the people who can afford to access this type of healthcare for their kids and those who can't, who have no, absolutely no choice at all, which is why, our nonprofit side, we, in the new year, we're going to look at ways of, our healthcare is private.
It's not for free and everybody should be able to access NHS care as and when they need it, gender affirmative care that allows them to walk through a process that doesn't have them jumping through hoops and having to sign up for clinical trials. Otherwise they don't get access to medication, which is totally ethically and morally wrong.
There's no way people should have to pay for this. But for us to be able to provide what we provide, we have to pay wages and we'd love to be able to offer it for free, but we are going to be stepping up our fundraising efforts in the new year to offer subsidized healthcare for people. The one thing that we can never cover is medication because we're not a medication provider.
We do not provide the medication at all. And people have to buy that. The other parts in terms of the therapeutic support, the referrals to the consultants for the prescribing, et cetera, who were all based in the EU, those things we would still be able to facilitate and under a subsidized care model.
And that's what we're hoping to be starting to really look into in the new year, because then at least it would just be the travel and the medication that people would have to find the money for. But at the moment people are having to find the lot. It's a huge burden on families already stretched, beyond capacity in an emotional manner because of what the government is doing by waging war on trans youth and blockers in particular.
Shoutout Radio: Do you see a point down the line where trans kids and their families will be knocking on EU country doors and saying that we want asylum?
Susie Green: Families are already moving. I've spoken to three families over the course of the last few weeks who are actively looking to move outside of the UK because of this.
And I think the, WPATH, EPATH, USPATH, AUSPATH, etc, all of the other countries in the world who, both France and Germany have come out with similar reports to the Cass Report that actually state that puberty blockers are really safe and effective and have got loads of evidence to support their use.
And they support affirmative care and they support affirmative use of cross sex hormones for young people as appropriate. We're international outliers now, and we're getting further and further away further down that diversity list. And what's even more shocking is the person who is driving this, is a gay man.
What on earth is going on in his head that he thinks this is okay? It's not. He's putting young people's lives in danger.
Shoutout Radio: Susie, we've run right out of time, I'm afraid. Thank you for joining us and no doubt we'll have you back in the future to see how things are going. And hopefully 2025 we'll see a rise back of help for trans kids, especially . Susie Green, thank you.
Susie Green: Thank you.
Read more statements from Anne Health about the puberty blocker ban on our News page here