{"id":219635,"date":"2025-06-27T21:40:19","date_gmt":"2025-06-27T21:40:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/219635\/"},"modified":"2025-06-27T21:40:19","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T21:40:19","slug":"the-ministry-of-health-has-imposed-an-age-limit-of-21-for-trans-peoples-hormone-medications","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/219635\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ministry of Health has imposed an age limit of 21 for trans people’s hormone medications"},"content":{"rendered":"

27\/06\/2025 | Writer: Y\u0131ld\u0131z Tar<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

In the letter sent by the Ministry to the governorates, it instructed that hormone medications must not be prescribed under any circumstances to individuals under the age of 21 for the purpose of \u201cchanging gender.\u201d The justification given was the Year of the Family.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"The<\/p>\n

The Turkish Medicines and Medical Devices Agency of the Ministry of Health has imposed a minimum age limit of 21 on hormones used by trans individuals in gender affirmation processes, through a letter sent to the governorates of all 81 provinces.<\/p>\n

Although the Civil Code sets the minimum age for undergoing gender-affirming surgery at 18, the Ministry restricted the use of testosterone-containing medications, gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) analogs, and medications containing 2 mg or more of estrogen for individuals under 21, in a letter titled \u201cAbuse of Sex Hormone Medications.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Ministry instructed governorates that \u201cthese medications must not be prescribed or reported under any circumstances for the purpose of gender transition.\u201d<\/p>\n

The restriction targets trans people<\/b><\/p>\n

In the letter dated June 25, it was stated that these medications may currently be prescribed for diagnoses such as cancer, infertility, precocious puberty, endometriosis, post-menopause, and uterine fibroids; however, they must not be prescribed to individuals under the age of 21 experiencing gender dysphoria.<\/p>\n

The Ministry\u2019s justification: Year of the Family<\/b><\/p>\n

In its directive, the Ministry cited the Year of the Family as the reason for the restriction. Referring to Article 41 of the Constitution, titled \u201cProtection of the Family and Children’s Rights,\u201d the Ministry framed trans people’s access to hormones as a \u201cthreat to cultural and moral values,\u201d thereby targeting them.<\/p>\n

The letter included the following statement:<\/p>\n

“The Presidency has declared 2025 as the \u2018Year of the Family.\u2019 In order to eliminate emerging threats to the structure of a healthy society and to our cultural and moral values, our Institution has deemed it necessary to take preventive measures.”<\/p>\n

Access to hormones was already restricted<\/b><\/p>\n

Access to hormones for trans people was restricted last year on November 20, the Transgender Day of Remembrance. The Turkish Medicines and Medical Devices Agency had introduced an e-prescription requirement for some of the hormone replacement therapy medications used by trans individuals in their gender affirmation processes.<\/p>\n

The draft anti-LGBTI+ bill has not come to the Parliament\u2019s agenda, but restrictions have already started in practice<\/b><\/p>\n

The age 21 restriction was also included in the draft bill on amendments to the Turkish Penal Code and some other laws, which KaosGL.org accessed in February. The draft bill was prepared by the Ministry of Justice based on the 4th Judicial Reform Strategy Document announced by AKP Chairman and President Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan on January 23, 2025.<\/p>\n

The draft, which has not yet come to the Parliament\u2019s agenda, proposed changing Article 40 of the Turkish Civil Code, titled \u201cGender Change,\u201d to raise the minimum age to begin the gender affirmation process from 18 to 21.<\/p>\n

One of the articles proposed to be amended in the bill was Article 225 of the Turkish Penal Code, titled \u201cIndecent Acts.\u201d If the draft becomes law, the term \u201cbiological sex\u201d will be added to the Penal Code. LGBTI+ expressions will be classified as \u201cindecency,\u201d and making these expressions visible will be punishable.<\/p>\n

Although the draft has not yet come to the Parliament\u2019s agenda, the Ministry of Health has taken action by restricting access to hormones for those under 21.<\/p>\n

CLICK-LGBTI+’s are targeted with amendments to the Civil Code and Penal Code<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Tags:<\/b>
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\thuman rights<\/a>, life<\/a>, family<\/a>, health<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"27\/06\/2025 | Writer: Y\u0131ld\u0131z Tar In the letter sent by the Ministry to the governorates, it instructed that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":219636,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4315],"tags":[105,86661,4326,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-219635","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-kaos-gl-news","10":"tag-medication","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114757502828683286","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219635"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219635\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}