The broom cupboard | The Tavistock Ep 2

About this episode

<p>Polly Carmichael became the director of the Gender Identity Development Service at the Tavistock in 2009. “I remember our office was literally a room that had probably been a broom cupboard at one stage”, she recalls. But the decision in 2011 to start offering puberty blockers to under-16s, and in 2016 to widen the professionals who could refer a child to GIDS had a major impact.&nbsp;The numbers of people on the waiting list ticked inexorably up, until the clinic felt it could barely cope.&nbsp;</p><br><p>Listen to the full series today. For the&nbsp;premium Tortoise listening experience, curated by our journalists,&nbsp;<a href="https://tortoisemedia.onelink.me/Cx9d/c770bd87" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>download the free Tortoise audio app</strong></a><strong>. </strong>For early and ad-free&nbsp;access to all our investigative series and daily and weekly shows,&nbsp;subscribe&nbsp;to Tortoise+ on Apple&nbsp;Podcasts.</p><br><p>If you’d like to further support slow journalism and help us build a different kind of newsroom, do consider donating to Tortoise at <a href="http://tortoisemedia.com/support-us" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">tortoisemedia.com/support-us</a>. Your contributions allow us to investigate, campaign and explore, and to build a newsroom that is responsible and sustainable.</p><hr><p style='color:grey; font-size:0.75em;'> Hosted on Acast. See <a style='color:grey;' target='_blank' rel='noopener noreferrer' href='https://acast.com/privacy'>acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.</p>