In April 2025, NHS England (NHSE) instructed a Brighton-based GP surgical procedure to cease prescribing masculinising and feminising hormones to youngsters below 18 who had been experiencing gender incongruence, or misery surrounding their gender identification. A joint NHS Sussex and NHSE investigation was introduced in June due to “issues” over the prescribing practices of Dr Sam Corridor and the WellBN observe. The official phrases of reference state that there are “indications that affected person hurt might have occurred”. The New Statesman can reveal that a number of well being authorities, together with the Common Medical Council (GMC) and NHSE, have been conscious of issues relating to those similar practices courting again no less than 5 years. At each a nationwide and native degree, the NHS has recognized that WellBN has been prescribing outdoors of all NHS tips for younger individuals, and but nobody has taken significant motion.
As of Could 2025, as much as 139 youngsters (below 18) had been in receipt of both irreversible hormones or medication to dam their puberty, or each, from Brighton’s WellBN observe. Whereas the bulk being prescribed hormones – testosterone for ladies wanting to seem extra masculine, oestrogen for males wishing to feminise their our bodies – had been aged between 15 and 17 and a half, official information present some had been below 13 years outdated. We have no idea the precise age of the youngest. Youngsters this younger have by no means been accepted for hormones in NHS specialist gender companies. It’s not authorized to challenge new prescriptions of puberty blockers (formally referred to as gonadotropin-releasing hormone agonists, or GnRHa) within the UK for remedy of gender-related misery outdoors of an NHS analysis trial. The New Statesman understands that WellBN didn’t provoke the prescribing of puberty blockers for any of those youngsters however continued it after taking on their care from personal suppliers.
The investigation will initially give attention to youngsters at present being prescribed. A second part will then give “additional consideration” to making an attempt to establish others “who had been below the age of 18 on the time of being prescribed drugs” however who are actually adults. It’s unclear how excessive that quantity is likely to be. Corridor has said publicly that between 2019 and 2025, the variety of trans and non-binary sufferers (adults and kids) on WellBN’s books grew from 60 to 2,500. Corridor, a trans man who moved from hospital care to common observe in 2019 partly to assist enhance trans healthcare, instructed Trans Delight Brighton throughout a YouTube interview that he sawhis arrival at WellBN as “a bit like a Pied Piper second. As quickly as I joined the observe, different individuals type of got here.”
This publication can reveal that issues across the security and welfare of youngsters below Corridor’s care had been first raised with NHSE in 2020 by different medical employees working in Sussex. Professionals had been involved by safeguarding issues regarding sure youngsters, Corridor’s lack of specialist information, and that prescriptions had been occurring outdoors of specialist NHS gender companies for youngsters. Corridor and WellBN brazenly state that they comply with the “knowledgeable consent” mannequin of look after younger gender-questioning sufferers, which removes any sort of psychological well being evaluation from the method of acquiring hormones or the necessity to see a specialist. The person is seen because the skilled on themselves. Docs ought to present info on hormone remedy in order that the person could make an knowledgeable resolution about their very own care. As Corridor places it, “This isn’t about you having an evaluation to see should you’re trans… you shouldn’t have to leap via hoops. You shouldn’t have to elucidate your self to anybody. You actually shouldn’t be psychiatrically analysed.”
Because of the 2020 criticism, an inside NHSE investigation was carried out. It concluded there have been no skilled issues over Corridor’s actions. As a substitute, the report pointed to the lengthy ready lists confronted by youngsters to be seen by NHS specialist companies and appeared to indicate that the issues might need been underpinned by transphobia. Additional issues from mother and father of a 16-year-old in receipt of a hormones prescription adopted in the summertime of 2023, and later that 12 months James Palmer – head of the NHS’s specialised companies, which cater for sufferers with uncommon or complicated situations – met with the household to listen to their story. It’s understood that in February 2024, each NHSE’s medical director and its medical director for main care had been briefed on the scenario and additional steps had been being thought-about. In March 2024, I revealed particulars of Corridor and WellBN’s prescribing of hormones to under-18s outdoors of NHS tips in my e-book, Time to Suppose. At no level throughout this era did NHSE place any restrictions on the actions of Corridor or his colleagues.
An NHS spokesperson stated: “We have now listened rigorously to issues from each professionals and oldsters in regards to the remedy of youngsters with gender incongruence by the WellBN Clinic in Brighton. This has knowledgeable among the main steps we’ve taken to rework the way in which the NHS offers gender healthcare for youngsters and younger individuals.” The spokesperson confirmed, “NHS skilled requirements groups have undertaken quite a lot of investigations.”
When the primary of no less than three complaints was raised with the regulator Common Medical Council (GMC) in 2021, the latter organisation cited the sooner NHSE report as motive for taking no motion in opposition to Corridor. But the New Statesman understands that, as a part of the criticism, the GMC was supplied with documentation purporting to point out that Corridor had, presently, prescribed puberty blockers to a number of youngsters below the age of 16 and was contemplating hormone remedy for these aged 16 and older.
Two additional complaints had been made to the GMC, each by mother and father of 16-year-olds being prescribed hormones by Corridor and the WellBN observe. Once more, the GMC discovered no case to reply. The latest criticism, submitted in October 2024, defined that the kid involved had cast their mother and father’ signature to acquire their first hormone prescription and was receiving specialist assist for psychological well being difficulties. It additionally referred to the Cass Evaluate into youth gender companies – the findings of which had been accepted in full by NHSE – which urged “a particularly cautious medical strategy and a robust medical rationale for offering hormones earlier than the age of 18”. The GMC’s temporary response, despatched in February 2025, stated that certainly one of its decision-makers was “assured that the issues contained in your criticism don’t increase issues that Dr Corridor poses both a danger to sufferers or undermines the general public’s confidence in medical doctors”. Because of this, the GMC would “not take the matter any additional and can shut our enquiry with no additional motion”.
A GMC spokesperson stated that the place issues are raised about a health care provider, its investigators “evaluation all related info out there to them, together with information of all earlier complaints and choices”. Selections, it continued, are made “on their benefit, and within the curiosity of sustaining confidence within the professions we regulate and affected person security”. The GMC is conscious of the continuing investigation into WellBN and is able to assess any info NHSE and NHS Sussex make out there to it. The NHS confirmed that it was “conscious of two GMC referrals in 2021 and 2025”.
Simply because the GMC and NHSE have recognized of Sam Corridor and WellBN’s prescribing practices for half a decade, so too has the native NHS in Sussex. Certainly, in a letter despatched by Corridor and his fellow GP companions at WellBN to NHS Sussex, seen by the New Statesman, the medical doctors say they’ve been “formally commissioned” by NHS Sussex to prescribe hormones to 17-year-olds and over since 2022. Furthermore, the letter, dated 15 April 2025, states that the WellBN crew “have been initiating remedy for gender incongruence with full transparency and together with your specific information to 16[-year-olds] and over for the previous 5 years”. Talking to Trans Delight Brighton in July 2025, Corridor stated: “I’ve been doing [it] for the final 5 years with the complete information of everyone within the system… What’s modified? Nothing. I’m not doing something totally different.”
What had modified is that the NHS was going through authorized motion. Lower than two months after the GMC had concluded – for the third time – there have been no security issues surrounding Sam Corridor’s practices at WellBN, NHS England got here to a very totally different conclusion. In a doc seen by the New Statesman, dated 8 April 2025, NHSE instructed the Sussex Built-in Care Board (NHS Sussex) that it was their view that “the strategy adopted by WellBN sits neither throughout the scope of a specialised [gender] service commissioned by NHS England” nor was it throughout the therapies supplied below the Common Medical Companies contract. (This outlines the core well being companies GPs are required to offer.) As a consequence, WellBN, of which Corridor was certainly one of three GP companions till his departure on the finish of June 2025, “must be instructed to stop providing the prescription of exogenous hormones for gender incongruence” to 16- and 17-year-olds.
NHS Sussex handed on a barely totally different message to the Brighton GP observe, nevertheless. It required WellBN to “instantly stop from providing, arranging or in any other case facilitating the prescription of exogenous hormones for gender incongruence… to any new sufferers [my emphasis] aged below 18”. There had been no such caveat that present prescriptions may proceed in NHSE’s instruction; the Sussex Built-in Care Board inserted it. Prescriptions are persevering with to be issued to youngsters whereas the investigation is below manner. The New Statesman is conscious of latest three-month prescriptions being issued in July.
“For my son, it’s disastrous,” one mum or dad instructed the New Statesman. Their male-born baby identifies as feminine and has been prescribed oestrogen and a testosterone blocker by WellBN for ten months. “It’s heartbreaking,” they added. “He’s utterly disengaged. He can not consider conditions correctly, or danger. He has misplaced quite a lot of the skills he used to have and there’s a noticeable decline in his cognitive talents mirrored in his faculty efficiency.” This mum or dad insists their baby has noticeably declined up to now 4 months, after NHSE instructed NHS Sussex that prescriptions ought to stop. Their baby continues to obtain hormones, as WellBN was instructed by the native NHS to stop issuing prescriptions to new sufferers solely. “It’s getting a lot worse. The physique modifications have develop into extra manifest, and he has develop into overweight. However his international functioning, I imply, he’s dysfunctional.” Furthermore, there was no promised enchancment in psychological well being. If something, they’ve seen their baby decline.
[See also: Hilary Cass interview: “Do I regret doing it? Absolutely not”]
Whereas WellBN’s younger sufferers haven’t complained in regards to the observe’s prescribing mannequin, a few of their mother and father are extraordinarily anxious on the potential hurt being completed to their adolescent youngsters. In Could, the New Statesman revealed the contents of two skilled witness reviews supplied in a separate courtroom case that had helped persuade the Well being Secretary, Wes Streeting, to ask NHSE to look once more at whether or not there would possibly should be additional restrictions on the prescribing of hormones to these aged 16 and 17. The authors of these reviews, medical doctors Professor Riittakerttu Kaltiala and Professor Jovanna Dahlgren, have immediately labored with a whole lot of gender-questioning youngsters. Each are employed by specialist youth gender clinics in Finland and Sweden, respectively.
They warned of extreme well being dangers related to prescribing hormones to youngsters and proof of significant well being difficulties for these on hormones for prolonged durations of time. Finland’s Kaltiala argued that using exogenous hormones, “just isn’t secure to any minors”. “It’s not potential to conclude that remedy with cross intercourse hormones is secure for below 18-year-olds, and having reached age 16 makes no distinction to this,” she stated, including that present analysis didn’t confirm “the assumed psychosocial and psychological well being advantages of cross-sex hormones initiated throughout developmental years”. (Defending its practices in a letter to NHS Sussex, WellBN argued that it was not in breach of contract as a result of trans and non-binary individuals may “rightly be thought-about to be sick with a situation (gender incongruence) from which restoration is predicted… We see higher psychological well being outcomes, restoration of capacity to operate in society, and fewer sufferers requesting surgical intervention.”)
The paediatric endocrinologist Dahlgren defined how Sweden’s medical doctors are not suggested to prescribe hormones to these below 18 and cited analysis which highlighted that trans ladies (“natal males”) had a considerably greater danger of ischemic stroke, venous thromboembolism (VTE) and coronary heart assaults. Dahlgren famous: “If the remedy is began in younger years, a few years with day by day remedy with cross intercourse hormones will enhance the chance of heart problems… and stroke… [and] can lower fertility, impair liver operate and enhance the chance of most cancers in each genders.” The hormone skilled added that, “The implications of prescribing cross intercourse hormones in people below the age of 18 years are that the physique and the mind are completely marked/modified with each recognized and extra unexpected penalties.”
After 5 years of unheeded warnings, an investigation is now below manner into the actions of Dr Sam Corridor and WellBN. However is something more likely to change? The investigation is led by NHS Sussex “with the help of NHS England”, in response to its phrases of reference. But each organisations have been conscious of all the points below investigation for years, and selected to do nothing till this 12 months. It has been recommended by some mother and father of youngsters prescribed hormones by WellBN that these two our bodies ought to themselves be seemed into as half of the investigation.
There have been months of delay between NHSE issuing its demand in April that WellBN stop prescribing and the investigation being introduced in June. Responding to this, WellBN issued an announcement via its web site, insisting that its youngsters’s service “is grounded in core medical ethics, together with respect for bodily autonomy and the best to make knowledgeable decisions”. The NHS has confirmed that, as of 25 August, not even the preliminary stage of reviewing particular person youngsters’s medical notes has begun, however ought to begin “within the coming weeks”. It’s not recognized how lengthy the method will take to finish. The NHS insists the investigation is unbiased, and will probably be carried out by a evaluation panel, led by an unbiased chair. It can report back to NHS England and NHS Sussex. The crew has been recognized by each healthcare our bodies and features a medical psychologist, paediatric nurse and a GP, in addition to two senior psychologists employed by NHS youngsters’s gender companies.
Within the meantime, youngsters – some below the age of 13 – are nonetheless receiving prescriptions for hormones and puberty blockers with, within the case of the previous, sure irreversible modifications taking place to their our bodies. When the investigation has been accomplished, NHSE has agreed to “urgently expedite switch of care of people into an NHS-commissioned service” – both an grownup gender clinic for these aged 17, or a youngsters’s hub for these youthful. Youngsters below 16 and on hormones will be unable to proceed receiving prescriptions on the NHS, nor will these whose puberty blocker remedy began after the ban got here into drive. Each could have their drugs safely withdrawn. WellBN will, nevertheless, have the ability to proceed prescribing to these whose remedy with puberty blockers started earlier than the ban. It’s understood that choices about withdrawal of hormones will solely be undertaken as soon as medical supervision is in place.
An NHS spokesperson stated: “Our clear precedence, and the main focus of this investigation, is to make sure that youngsters and younger individuals are receiving secure and acceptable care.” Having been made conscious that issues about WellBN date again some 5 years, a spokesperson for the Division of Well being and Social Care stated that it took the issues raised concerning prescribing practices at WellBN clinic “extraordinarily critically” and was “dedicated to making sure that each one healthcare suppliers comply with acceptable medical protocols and safeguards when treating younger individuals”. The spokesperson continued, “The place issues are raised about affected person security, we won’t hesitate to take decisive motion to guard youngsters and maintain these accountable to account.”
Regardless of the end result, ought to this investigation discover that any baby has been harmed because of WellBN’s medical strategy to gender-questioning youth, not one of the organisations liable for defending these younger individuals and guaranteeing they obtain secure care will have the ability to say it couldn’t have been prevented. Not the NHS, not the GMC, nor the federal government. They had been warned. Repeatedly. And did nothing.
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