WaPo Ignores Huge Errors In Study Claiming 97 Percent Of Opposite-Sex Hormone-Takers Have No Regrets

On Nov. 11, The Washington Post published an article titled “Most transgender people have no regrets years after hormone therapy, study says.” According to the Post, nearly 97 percent of individuals who began taking opposite-sex hormones as youths believed they made the right decision. Only about 3 percent reported regret, and fewer than 2 percent reported harm. Sounds pretty convincing, doesn’t it? Nearly 97 percent of transgender people who received hormone therapy as teenagers did not regret it five years later, a study found.Though some patients did regret medically transitioning, those rates are relatively low compared to other medical interventions.…— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) November 11, 2026 Not so much. The study, published in JAMA Pediatrics on Nov. 9, examined satisfaction and regret among individuals who began taking opposite-sex hormones in their youth. Researchers reported that 360 of 372 respondents believed starting on hormones was the “right decision.” That’s the number making headlines. But here’s what the Post conveniently never shared with its readers. According to the study’s own participant flowchart, 839 young people underwent an initial assessment at the transgender facility. Of those, 729 consented to the research, and ultimately 698 were sent the annual survey. Of those 698 individuals, 297 never completed it. That’s approximately 43 percent of the people contacted whose experiences remain unknown. The researchers couldn’t determine whether those individuals had started taking opposite-sex hormones, continued treatment, or regretted their decisions. Of the 401 who responded, 25 had never received hormones, leaving 376 participants in the final sample. Four did not complete the regret scale. So that impressive 97 percent figure represents the responses of 372 people, not the entire population initially assessed. Whether those results represent the missing participants remains unanswered. The Post told readers that researchers “surveyed 376” people. They didn’t. They surveyed 698. The 376 are simply the respondents who had taken hormones. The 297 who never answered don’t appear anywhere in the Post’s story. And there’s more. Of the 376 participants who started opposite-sex hormones, 65 were no longer taking hormones when surveyed. Among those 65, approximately 14 percent reported regret. That’s considerably different from the overall 3 percent figure. Nearly everyone reporting regret or harm had discontinued treatment. In fact, 311 of the 376 participants were still taking hormones when surveyed. The researchers also acknowledged that they never investigated why these individuals discontinued treatment. To make matters more interesting, eight respondents now identified as their biological sex, and seven of those eight accounted for more than half of the 13 participants who reported regret or harm. Among the nine participants who provided written descriptions of their regret or harm, seven reported not feeling “adequately prepared to make an informed decision” because of their age, maturity, mental health difficulties, or insufficient support. Nearly 92 percent of the participants began opposite-sex hormones at 17 or younger. And while the average time since beginning treatment was approximately five years, some had started as recently as 1.2 months before the survey. The Post, meanwhile, described the responses as coming “five years after the initial treatment.” Five years was the average, not the minimum. How much can we possibly know about long-term regret when some participants have barely begun treatment? And who conducted this research? Workers from the very facilities providing the treatment. The authors acknowledged that this relationship might have discouraged some former hormone recipients from participating. Detransitioners (or desisters) already feel bullied, ostracized, and harassed for their decision to reverse course, so expecting them to participate in a study from the very organization that encouraged this form of mutilation is absurd and unrealistic. That facility followed the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) guidelines — the same standards of care this study now endorses. The researchers even presented an earlier version of their findings at WPATH’s own 2024 symposium. Participants were paid between $45 and $65 for completing the survey. And taxpayers footed the bill: The project behind the study has received more than $2.5 million from the National Institutes of Health. So a facility that follows WPATH’s playbook surveyed its own patrons, paid them to respond, previewed the results at WPATH’s conference, and concluded that WPATH’s standards should stay in place. And the one outside expert the Post chose to quote? Scott Leibowitz, who sits on WPATH’s board. Not a single critic made the cut. Yet despite these limitations, the researchers concluded that their findings support existing standards of care and oppose categorical restrictions on minors taking opposite-sex hormones. That’s a significant policy conclusion to draw from a single-facility study with so many unanswered questions. What do other studies show? Well, Do No Harm — an organization that helps concerned citizens keep harmful ideologies out of medicine — lists multiple studies that paint a very different picture. One of them, a 2022 study of 952 young patients in the U.S. military health system, found that nearly 30 percent had stopped hormones within four years, and among those taking testosterone, it was closer to 36 percent. Another survey of 100 detransitioners found that only 24 percent ever told their transgender intervention providers they had stopped, which is exactly why a facility surveying its own former patrons may never hear from the ones who walked away. The Post reported the reassuring percentages while failing to examine the missing responses and the considerably higher regret rate among those who discontinued treatment. None of this proves the missing participants regretted their decisions. But it certainly raises questions about how confidently these findings can be applied to other young people. When we’re discussing hormonal interventions involving minors and potentially permanent physical changes, the public deserves the full picture. And journalism is supposed to provide it. Soad Tabrizi, LMFT, is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, writer, and founder of Conservative Counselors – a directory connecting reality-based therapists with clients seeking mental health care without fear of ideological judgment. Based in Orange County, California, she operates a private practice and is licensed in nine states. She writes on Substack, where she also hosts a monthly live show, On the Couch, for her subscribers. Her work challenges the ideological capture of psychology and calls out woke orthodoxy in therapy and culture. An unapologetic Christian and outspoken advocate for conservative clinicians, she fights for their rightful place in the mental health profession. corporate mediacross-sex hormonesdetransitionersgender ideologyjamalegacy mediaopposite-sex hormonestransgendertransgenderismWashington PostWPATH