South Dakota has banned doctors from performing experimental sex changes on gender-confused minors after Governor Kristi Noem signed the Help Not Harm Bill into law Monday.
HB1080 bans any attempt to perform a medical sex change on a person under 18 years of age. This includes non-surgical interventions such as puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones as well as surgeries such as bilateral mastectomies, hysterectomies, and genital surgeries.
Any healthcare professional found to be in violation of the law risks civil lawsuits and the loss of their medical license.
"South Dakota’s kids are our future. With this legislation, we are protecting kids from harmful, permanent medical procedures,” said Governor Kristi Noem in a press release. "I will always stand up for the next generation of South Dakotans."
This move to protect children from becoming the victims of what one pediatric neurosurgeon recently called "an extraordinary medical atrocity" comes after years of effort from concerned South Dakotans.
Rep. Fred Deutsch first proposed such a ban three years ago, and tweeted Monday to thank all those who have been working for years to protect children.
"South Dakota's Help Not Harm Bill, HB1080, was signed into law today by @govkristinoem. This concludes the effort I began three years ago with HB1057. Many good people have worked to protect our children, and much thanks goes to Rep. Bethany Soye, the sponsor of HB1080," said Deutsch.
The ACLU responded to the law being passed by saying that the ban would rob young people of the chance to become "thriving transgender adults."
"This ban won’t stop South Dakotans from being trans, but it will deny them critical support that helps struggling transgender youth grow up to become thriving transgender adults," the ACLU tweeted.
But evidence is mounting that many of these young people are far from "thriving." Waves of young people are now speaking out about the regret they feel about undergoing a medical sex change when still young and in a crucial stage of identity development. Malpractice lawsuits are underway in several nations, and the rate of detransition is rising sharply.
Countries that have undertaken systematic reviews of the evidence for child sex changes have found it to be of such poor quality that each nation has put the brakes on this reckless medical experiment. Sweden and Finland have already banned puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors except for the strictest of clinical trial settings and England is expected to follow suit upon completion of the independent review of its gender service.
Several U.S. states have already moved to protect gender-confused children from the harm of these experimental and invasive medical interventions.
