‘The Protocol’: The Story Behind Medical Care for Transgender Kids

This episode contains strong language.

Since 2021, nearly half the states in the U.S. have passed bans on medical treatments for transgender minors. The Trump administration is now targeting the care, and in the coming weeks, the Supreme Court is expected to weigh in.

Against that backdrop, “The Daily” is running the first episode of a six-part series from NYT Audio about the story of youth gender medicine — where it came from, whom it was meant to help, and what may come next in the legal and political fights over its future.

It starts in the Netherlands, with a clinical psychologist and a 16 year-old who was determined to go through life as the gender he had long felt he was.

Guests: Azeen Ghorayshi is a reporter for The New York Times covering the intersection of sex, gender and science. Austin Mitchell is a supervising audio producer for The New York Times.

You can find all six episodes of “The Protocol,” along with additional reading material, at nytimes.com/theprotocol.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

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