Would you trust a health professional who thinks men can get pregnant? Almost certainly not, yet NHS trusts up and down the country are asking male patients about their “pregnancy status” before they have a CT scan. Just to show how ridiculous the question is, in some hospitals radiographers have been told to ask men as old as 60 — disqualified by age as well as gender — whether they might be pregnant.

“It’s mortifying to repeatedly ask middle-aged men — who at that moment have presented for life-saving treatment and are hooked up to monitors and multiple drips — what their sex is. Or worse, if they could be pregnant,” a senior radiographer told the Telegraph. The paper says that around 20 NHS trusts have told staff to ask all patients aged 12 to 55 whether they might give birth, regardless of their sex.

Apparently, the guidance was introduced after a woman who identified as a man had a CT scan, not realising she was pregnant. According to whistleblowers who have talked to the Telegraph, however, policies dictated by trans activism and other fashionable ideologies are causing strife in hospitals and compromising patient care.

An NHS trust in Yorkshire, for instance, offers staff “anti-racism” training that supposedly develops a “deeper understanding of white privilege”. Hundreds of thousands of pounds are being spent on such courses in the name of  diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Yet they are open to accusations of prioritising slogans — and inducing guilt in well-meaning members of staff — while deep-seated problems remain untouched.

The extreme sensitivity of the NHS towards trans individuals, who make up a tiny proportion of the population, is a prime example. Imposing nonsensical language such as “pregnant people” does nothing to improve the functioning of maternity services, which have been the subject of one scandal after another. Indeed, the Government has asked Baroness Amos to undertake a “rapid review” of maternity services in 14 trusts, following allegations that the deaths of more than 800 babies could have been prevented in a single year between 2022-23.

That review will pay “particular attention” to the question of why black and Asian families have noticeably poorer outcomes. It’s one of the “racial inequalities” identified in the NHS by Health Secretary Wes Streeting back in February: black women are three times as likely as white women to die in childbirth, while black men are twice as likely as white men to die of prostate cancer.

The question posed by the testimony of whistleblowers, however, is whether DEI actually improves outcomes for patients from minority backgrounds. The risk of a trans-identifying woman being given a scan while pregnant could easily have been avoided if all NHS records stated sex correctly. But that would mean ignoring another policy demanded by activists: namely, allowing trans people to change their sex markers on official documents.

Instead of hospitals becoming safer, NHS trusts have encouraged — some would say bullied — staff into displaying Pride flags and watching their language. Streeting is often praised for speaking more sense than many of his colleagues, and he has acknowledged that “some really daft things” are done in the name of DEI. But even he refuses to call a halt to all the absurdities introduced into the NHS by an obsession with performative gestures.

Making sure patients receive the right treatment is surely more important than trying to avoid terms that might upset the easily offended. But it only takes a small group of zealots to capture an institution even as large as the NHS. Loosening their grip, and protecting patients from surreal and unnecessary interrogations, may be a task beyond our current crop of ministers.

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Joan Smith is a novelist and columnist. She was previously Chair of the Mayor of London’s Violence Against Women and Girls Board, and is on the advisory group for Sex Matters. Her book Unfortunately, She Was A Nymphomaniac: A New History of Rome’s Imperial Women was published in November 2024.

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