The National health Service has published an update to its ‘Constitution’. In particular, it will no longer be possible for transgender women to request access to rest and hygiene areas reserved for women.
In a document published on April 30 on its website and presenting the upcoming changes to its “Constitution”, the National Health Service (British health system) defines sex as a determining biological reality in the care provided to patients. A major and significant turning point in the UK’s positioning on gender issues in the medical sphere.
The NHS “Constitution”, updated at least once every ten years, is a manifesto setting out its principles, values, rights and commitments. Among the changes proposed a few days ago and still subject to an eight-week consultation until June 25, a paragraph is devoted to care related to gender transition. From the first lines of the chapter, the NHS offers a definition of sex that is anything but trivial in the current context of gender claims. “We define sex as biological sex.” A formulation welcomed by opponents of gender ideology as a “return to reason”.
Single-sex care and health spaces
The NHS further states that access to health services implies a right for patients to “receive care and treatment that is appropriate for them, meets their needs and preferences”. The health institution wants patients to be able to freely assert these needs and preferences, “including to request that intimate care be carried out by a person of the same sex” (the intimate nature being associated with body hygiene care, as well as medical examinations of the breasts and genital or rectal organs).
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The NHS goes even further in its statement, announcing that patients will no longer be able to share rooms, showers and toilets with patients of the opposite sex. In fact, it will no longer be possible for transgender women, that is to say of male biological sex, to request access to rest and hygiene spaces reserved for women. Faced with previous NHS guidelines from 2021, allowing transgender patients to be placed in spaces based on their gender identity and not their sex, some patients complained about having to share a sleeping space with male patients.
“Clear and understandable language for everyone”
On the same day of the publication of the NHS, Victoria Atkins, British secretary for social and health care, said, in an interview on the microphone of the Times Radio relayed by the Mail Onlinethat“it is not necessary to eradicate the word “woman” to respect everyone’s rights” and that it is appropriate to avoid using a “artificial language” in the name of inclusiveness. “We want language that is clear and understandable for everyone”undoubtedly referring to the multiple expressions invented to circumvent the gendered nature of certain terms (“people with ovaries” rather than “women”, “breastfeeding from the chest” rather than“breastfeeding”, etc.). Speaking to Sky News, she said it was vital that the “biological sex is respected”, in the same way as the right of individuals to“privacy, dignity and security”. In the columns of Times, she also returns to the frequent anecdotes “eccentric” experienced by women accused of discrimination after requesting access to single-sex spaces. “That’s not possible”she concludes.
These changes in British health policy come a few weeks after the publication of a report by pediatrician Hilary Cass, in which she revealed the absence of reliable data on hormonal treatments prescribed to young transgender people. Calling for extreme caution in prescribing these treatments, the report is the result of a study commissioned by the NHS in 2020, in response to a sharp increase in the number of children and young people wishing to transition.
