From the "what took you so long?" file, a Republican U.S. congressman has introduced legislation that would ban gender-related medical procedures from being performed on minors.
On behalf of all sane, decent human beings in America: It's about dang time.
Fox News reported on the long-overdue proposal:
Rep. Bob Onder, R-Mo., who is behind the bill, has a medical degree and is sounding the alarm over the impact that gender-related treatments can have on minors. The congressman told Fox News Digital that his bill will not only protect minors from these treatments, but will also give children and parents the right to hold medical professionals accountable in court.
Onder issued a strong statement against clinics and physicians that participate in such practices.
'We know that in the last 15 years, the transgender movement has convinced tens of thousands of boys and girls that they are born in the wrong body.... And then a chain of transgender clinics has exploited these kids for the ideology and for the profit and really done permanent damage to the health of those kids with wrong sex hormones, puberty blockers and even mutilating surgeries,' Onder told Fox News Digital.
The bill is named after Chloe Cole, an outspoken detransitioning advocate, who underwent hormone therapy and surgeries as a teenager before expressing regret and returning to living life as a female.
'While we've made significant strides in raising awareness and enacting protections in recent years, the fight is far from over. Too many children remain at risk of irreversible harm from puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgical procedures pushed on them before they can fully understand the consequences,' Cole said in a statement provided exclusively to Fox News Digital.
'We must finish what we've started and safeguard the next generation from these experimental and barbaric treatments,' she added.
