Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science

Every piece called out here is clearly labeled "opinion" - did they even read the normal news and analysis sections? Countless newspapers and outlets and actual scientific journals have opinion/editorial sections that are generally very well firewalled from the factual content. You could collect the worst hot takes from a few years of nearly any site with a dedicated opinion page and pretend that it has gone downhill. But that this the whole point of having a separate opinion section — so opinions have a place to go, and are not slipped into factual reporting. And many opinion pieces are submitted by others or solicited as a way to show a view that the newsroom doesn't or can't espouse.

Whether the EIC of SciAm overstepped with her own editorializing is probably not something we as outsiders can really say, given the complexities of running a newsroom. I would caution people against taking this superficial judgment too seriously.

Not true, this is not labeled anywhere I can see as opinion, but does include an editors note to a suicide helpline, and a correction...

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-are-puberty-...

What isn’t factual in this article? Is it political because it discusses puberty blockers and transgender adolescents?

One part that isn’t factual is the statement on safety of GnRHs which cites their use in treating precocious puberty, which is a completely different indication and treatment (age of treatment, length of treatment, purpose of treatment), and does not consider the impact on psychosexual development, nor consider the impact on desistance of non-trans kids. The “safe and reversible” narrative originates in medical consensus amongst doctors and activists, not evidence from scientific enquiry. The difference between consensus-based medicine and evidence-based medicine eludes most participants in this debate.

The statement regarding precocious puberty is entirely factual, and the statement linking that claim to supplying the same hormones to trans kids is linked to an article containing more detail (including a discussion of possible downsides and links to actual papers). I'd agree wholeheartedly that the difference between consensus and evidence-based medicine eludes most participants in the debate, but frankly that seems to apply far more to the side of the debate whose higher quality analysis is of the form of "it appears the systematic studies the other side have done might exhibit researcher bias, so rather than do our own retrospective on the same research subjects we'll just move for speedy consensus to ban the practice altogether"

It is certainly not factual to claim that a drug which is safe in treatment X (precocious puberty) is also safe in treatment Y (gender dysphoria). The article conflates both as “puberty delaying treatments”, as if the learning from one is completely transferable to the other. It is not. The differences I mentioned are material.

The “side” (scare quotes, for there are multiple positions available, not just those that come through the lens of US politics) with the higher quality analysis is that expressed in the Cass Review, which does not call for a ban, but rather for clinical trials and a data linkage study (for which data linking adult outcomes to pediatric gender interventions has so far been withheld by the relevant clinics - draw your own conclusions about why they would not want that to be surfaced).

The differences may well be material, but as I mentioned in the post above it's simply false to claim SA conflate the two when they link (multiple times) to an article looking at trans people specifically and also mention that they are healthy and safe when prescribed to other young people for other reasons. An article which links to an article discussing outcomes of a drug in young people that also mentions below that it's routinely and uncontroversially prescribed in old people would not be factually inaccurate, even though young people and old people are evidently not identical and it is not impossible the two have different outcomes.

The Cass Review itself offers no evidence the blockers are dangerous or inevitably irreversible (or if one takes a less cautious approach, cause patients more problems with irreversibility than not using them), merely finding that only two papers providing evidence for the treatment being safe and optimal were of "high quality" with others being of "moderate" quality or "low" quality and calling for another trial. It did not find higher quality papers drawing opposing conclusions. People more knowledgeable and cynical than me have suggested that treatments for other, less politically-charged but complex conditions may also suffer from the literature that supports clinicians preferred approach being of "moderate" quality but seldom face shutdown as a result. The side that trumpeted this conclusion (because it very much is political, even in the UK) delightedly concluded that as the favourably-disposed evidence mostly fell short of excellence, all gender affirming care must be shut down permanently. Perhaps you view things differently and would very much like to see the new clinics opened and a clinical trial designed to Ms Cass' liking devised, but it's safe to say most of the people trumpeting it as the last word in the debate would not.

When reading the article I do get the impression they try to downplay the potential risks.

quote 1: “These puberty-pausing medications are widely used in many different populations and safely so,” McNamara says.

quote 2: “From an ethical and a legal perspective, this is a benign medication,” Giordano says. She is puzzled by the extra scrutiny these treatments receive, considering their benefits and limited risks. “There are no sound clinical, ethical or legal reasons for denying them to those in need,” she says.

quote 3: Like any medication, GnRHas carry the potential for adverse effects.

Now if you read one of the studies they link (https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7497424/).

quote: "Arguments against the use of GnRHa that have been raised include possible long-term adverse effects on health, psychological, and sexual functioning (Laidlaw, Cretella, & Donovan, 2019; Richards, Maxwell, & McCune, 2019; Vrouenraets et al., 2015)."

I really feel like they overstate the strength of their positions with the articles they cite. All of them show clear limitations of the results which clearly show we need more data.