The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS), which represents 92% of board-certified plastic surgeons in the U.S., issued a new position statement recommending that surgeons delay all chest, genital, and facial gender surgeries until patients reach at least age 19. The recommendation cites “insufficient evidence” to support the procedures for patients under 19, breaking from other major medical groups in the U.S. that have supported these treatments. The ASPS concluded that the current evidence base for these interventions is of “low certainty” regarding mental health outcomes.
The organization cited “emerging concerns about potential long-term harms and the irreversible nature of surgical interventions in a developmentally vulnerable population,” as well as the inability of clinicians to reliably predict whether a child’s gender dysphoria will persist or resolve naturally by adulthood. The ASPS challenged the “urgency framing” often used in pediatric gender care, arguing that ethical decision-making should not be driven by “crisis claims” characterizing surgery as “life-saving” to prevent suicide. The organization stated: “Established principles of biomedical ethics dictate that physicians should offer interventions only when there is a reasonable expectation that anticipated benefits outweigh potential harms, with proportionately greater caution required as uncertainty and risk increase.”
Supporting Evidence and HHS Response
The ASPS cited concerns raised in the 2024 Cass Review and the May 2025 evidence review from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, both of which identified significant limitations in study quality and gaps in documenting long-term physical and psychological outcomes. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. commended ASPS for “standing up to the overmedicalization lobby and defending sound science.” Deputy HHS Secretary Jim O’Neill called the move a “victory for biological truth.” The ASPS reaffirmed its opposition to criminalization of medical care, stating that regulation is best achieved through “professional self-regulation” rather than punitive legislation.
This article is an AI-assisted summary. All facts and figures are drawn from the original report: https://www.foxnews.com/media/major-medical-organization-urges-delaying-youth-gender-surgeries