Experimental drug to prevent lesbianism

[Zuul]

Blog about it here.

There are a bunch of issues with this one. Aside from the fact that the drug probably isn't doing any good for the intersex condition it's supposed to treat (by the time they know to prescribe it, there's probably already genital ambiguity in the fetus anyway), side-effects include low birth weight, central nervous system effects, cleft palate, liver enlargement, a decrease in fetal beta cells and other negative outcomes in animals.

And then of course...preventing lesbianism? Really?

[jali]

This is scary shit!

There are so many fatal illnesses that need additional research, and money was spent so that this crap is here today.

Bullshit! Bull Shit.

We're going back to the 50s with this type of medicine - what's next, a reapplication of shock treatment to "cure" homosexuality?

Shit.

[Exy]

Dr. New maintains contact with all children treated prenatally, and has found not permanent adverse effects of treatment on mother or fetus. Thus, with nearly 20 years’ experience, the treatment has been found safe for mother and child.

Prenatal use of the drug is associated with low birth weight, central nervous system effects, cleft palate, liver enlargement, a decrease in fetal beta cells and other negative outcomes in animals.

But, whatevs, as long as it stops her from licking box, right?

This is fucking outrageous. This woman is a menace and the parents who would consent to this are sick.

[Zuul]

...and the parents who would consent to this are sick.

In my experience, people can be absolute morons when it comes to their kids and doctors. Not all people, but a disturbing number of them. If a charismatic doctor comes along and tells them she can prevent abnormalities (the intersex condition, which she can't) and if she doesn't do this they might never, ever have grandbabies (except intersexed people and lesbians, when fertile, will often have kids), a lot of people aren't going to ask questions. They'll just do what the doctor tells them to do, without even fully realizing that it's a choice. The Dr. New story is just the modern twist on Dr. Money, who also never had a shortage of parents letting him experiment on their children in pursuit of "normal."

Since there appears to be a critical period in brain development when things like gender identity and sexual orientation are laid down, throwing drugs at fetuses willy nilly isn't going to even fix the problem it's supposed to be fixing and anybody with a grasp of medicine who's aware of the research should know it. This isn't just unethical and horrifying, but bad science verging on voodoo.

[Zuul]

Oh, wait. Reading further I see that I was wrong about how they're admnistering it:

Because the steroid is given before the sex of the fetus can be known, and because only some of the fetuses will have CAH, 87.5 percent of the pregnant women started on dexamethasone for this use are not even carrying an affected child. (In fact, half of the fetuses started on the treatment will be males.) They will not receive the treatment past the point at which their fetuses’ sex and CAH-status are accurately diagnosed; nonetheless, for a period of fetal development (including, obviously, brain development), almost 90 percent of those fetuses are being given a steroid that might harm them and can do them no good whatsoever.

[Bolding mine.]

[hatesfreedom]

I can't wait till we start editing out the genes that cause people to be gay. It's gonna be fabulous.

[Zuul]

Most likely such genes don't exist, hates, but it'd be safer doing it that way than denying otherwise ordinary little boys the androgens they need to develop out of the fear that maybe, just maybe, a lesbian might be gestating.

[hatesfreedom]

I had always assumed being gay was genetic like pretty much every other thing a human is. Infact I still do.

[Exy]

Oh, wait. Reading further I see that I was wrong about how they're admnistering it:



[Bolding mine.]

Wait, they're administering testosterone-blocking drugs to males as well? Thus, it would seem, increasing the chances a boy will be born with underdeveloped genitalia or hypospadias or ambiguous genitalia.

This is horrifying.

[Cluricaun]

Speaking as someone who is an experimental drug to treat lesbianism himself, this is sick, wrong, and should be made as illegal as possible right now.

[Zuul]

Wait, they're administering testosterone-blocking drugs to males as well? Thus, it would seem, increasing the chances a boy will be born with underdeveloped genitalia or hypospadias or ambiguous genitalia.

This is horrifying.

Yes, exactly. Close to 90% of these pregnancies don't involve a female fetus affected with CAH. Statistically 50% of these pregnancies won't involve a female at all.

For the sake of preventing intersex conditions in 12.5% of these fetuses you're potentially causing intersex conditions in 50% of these fetuses. The math, it hurts.

[OtakuLoki]

The math is bad enough, but currently the understanding for just how the various endocrine balances interact to affect fetal development is crude, at best.

My understanding is that a lot of seemingly unrelated development within the fetus is actually affected, and sometimes regulated, by the so-called sexual hormones. There is literally no way to be certain, at this time, what sort of developmental botches are being encouraged by this treatment.

[Zuul]

My understanding is that a lot of seemingly unrelated development within the fetus is actually affected, and sometimes regulated, by the so-called sexual hormones. There is literally no way to be certain, at this time, what sort of developmental botches are being encouraged by this treatment.

While there are side-effects associated with this particular drug, the lack of androgens alone during a brief period may not cause that many problems for the XX fetuses. I'm not saying they won't, but just that a female fetus can probably handle a brief period without them, due to what we know from androgen insensitivity.

Complete androgen insensitivity syndrome (CAIS) prevents an XY fetus from utilizing androgens and what results is an externally female child with testes hidden in the abdomen and a shallow vagina. Puberty happens a bit later than in XX individuals, but the testosterone the undescended testes produce is converted into estradiol (since the body can't use it as testosterone due to the CAIS), causing breast formation. The lack of menstruation, acne or body hair that are typical with puberty are the only external indications that anything unusual is happening. So if a fetus is developing ovaries and a uterus anyway and will later on be capable of utilizing androgens (and there's nothing to indicate she won't be) that part of things is less likely to cause problems.

However, the XY fetuses are missing out on androgens for a short period of time. They need those to develop male structures. They aren't denied for the full pregnancy, meaning that they won't be born appearing female, but they very likely could have micropenis or malformed gonads or their brains might be feminized.

[What Exit?]

Experimental drugs and fetuses should pretty much never be brought together unless the fetus has some kind of clear problem. To do this as a preventative measure does sound if not criminal then monstrous at least.

... or their brains might be feminized.

What does this part mean?

[Zuul]

What does this part mean?

Right now, we don't know what all of the ramifications of brain feminization in an XY individual might be. Different degrees of it have been associated with homosexuality and identification as a female (such as in the cases of those with CAIS, who typically identify as straight women, even more often than XX individuals), but we've only been able to identify a correlative relationship. This is all big, scary new territory and not a place to be experimenting on babies.

[5er]

It's not a place to be experimenting on anyone.

I feel like crying.

[vison]

What am I missing here? I read the blog linked to in the first post and I guess I failed to "get it". How can anyone know what hormones a foetus is exposed to? Like, is this just, you know, "Hey, don't wanna take a chance on a lesbian baby? Let us give you hormones!" ?????? Is that what this is? What the HELL? What the HELL? Jesus H. Christ.

Do they do tests on the foetus to see if it's XX or XY, or what?

Someone explain this to me. It's so vile and ghastly I am almost foaming at the mouth here.

[OtakuLoki]

vison this is just my quickie understanding, and I may be mistaken. What they're talking about are fetuses that have been found to have a genetic predisposition towards something called CAH. This condition may affect the formation of genitalia, and be related to other ambiguous sex-related traits. It's a bit more detailed than finding out XX vs XY. It's also ignoring that there are many, many factors that affect how a fetus develops, and that genes, alone, don't determine everything.

The testing can find the predisposition to CAH, as I understand it. It can't tell, until after the treatment has been in progress for some time, whether the specific fetus is actually showing signs of irregular development.

ETA: It is ghastly and vile, and I think foaming at the mouth is a healthy reaction to this atrocity, BTW.

[Exy]

Do they do tests on the foetus to see if it's XX or XY, or what?

At least according to what Zuul quoted, they're administering it before it's possible to determine the baby's sex, so half the affected fetuses are male.