The Washington Post editorial board defended the Trump administration for issuing a detailed report on transgender surgeries for children, an area of research that is highly controversial among scientists.
"The good news is that the executive order provided some of what is too often missing in the debate over transgender medical care for children," the Post wrote on Sunday, defending the Trump administration for investigating the topic through the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). "It directed the secretary of health and human services to publish a review of the existing literature on best practices within 90 days, and this review is now out."
The report from HHS was issued following President Donald Trump's issuance of an executive order in January titled, "Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation."
In the order, the administration stated that medical professionals in the U.S. are "maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions."
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The Washington Post called the wording of the order "hyperbole" but said that "better evidence and reasoned discussion about the trade-offs involved in intervening with the biological process of puberty in children who experience gender dysphoria" is necessary.
"Critics have been scathing about what they see as the report’s bias and shortcomings," the editorial board wrote. "But it makes a legitimate case for caution that policymakers need to wrestle with."
The HHS report, the editorial board explained, finds common ground with other scientific reviews, including in Britain. The Washington Post pointed out that there are serious concerns about the scientific basis for interfering in the growth process of children in "clear and careful language."
The report also demonstrates the "ethical quandaries involved in intervening in the sexual development of minors, who might not be mature enough to give fully informed consent."
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Trump's executive order on transgender surgeries states that it is "the policy of the United States that it will not fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called ‘transition’ of a child from one sex to another."
"Countless children soon regret that they have been mutilated and begin to grasp the horrifying tragedy that they will never be able to conceive children of their own or nurture their children through breastfeeding," the order states. "Moreover, these vulnerable youths’ medical bills may rise throughout their lifetimes, as they are often trapped with lifelong medical complications, a losing war with their own bodies, and, tragically, sterilization."
HHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.
Fox News' Kendall Tietz contributed to this report.
