American Society of Plastic Surgeons: Position Statement on Gender Surgery for Children and Adolescents

March 17, 2026:

The American Society of Plastic Surgeons’ (ASPS) Position Statement on Gender Surgery for Children and Adolescents, issued February 3, 2026, marks a significant shift in the medical establishment’s stance on gender-related interventions for minors. Drawing on the UK’s Cass Review, national policy reversals in Finland and Sweden, and a 2025 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services report, ASPS concludes that the evidence base for gender-related surgical interventions in minors low. As such, ASPS recommends that surgeons delay all gender-related breast/chest, genital, and facial surgery until a patient is at least 19 years old.

The statement makes a detailed ethical case for why these procedures carry a higher threshold than other surgeries performed on adolescents, citing their irreversibility, the uncertain natural history of gender dysphoria, and the lack of reliable methods to predict which young people’s distress will persist versus resolve on its own. It also pushes back on the “life-saving” framing sometimes used to justify these interventions, noting that ethical decision-making should not be driven by crisis claims when the incremental impact of surgery on suicide prevention remains unknown.

This position statement is a valuable resource for parents, policymakers, healthcare professionals, and advocates seeking to understand where the medical conversation currently stands on gender surgeries for children and adolescents.

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