A report released last month by the Department of Health and Human Services that claims to review the “evidence and best practices for promoting the health of children and adolescents with gender dysphoria” cites a study on a scientifically dubious diagnosis, “rapid-onset gender dysphoria,” that was retracted by its first publisher.
The report also cites dozens of studies from a controversial scientific journal that has been accused of bias. Thirty scientific papers and commentary pieces cited were published in the little-known journal Archives of Sexual Behavior — the most citations the report makes to any single publication. The journal’s editor-in-chief, Kenneth Zucker, has promoted a treatment that encourages gender dysphoric children to be comfortable with their sex assigned at birth, which critics claim amounts to a form of conversion therapy. Zucker disputes this characterization.
Traditional scientific publishing has drawn the ire of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose “Make America Healthy Again” Commission assessment dedicated several sections to what it described as prejudices inherent to the publishing community. Kennedy has even proposed a ban on government scientists publishing in some prestigious research publications, calling them “corrupt.”