Its author has had to fend off criticism and misinformation, but the report offers hope for a realistic conversation

As the dust settles around Hilary Cass’s report – the most extensive and thoroughgoing evidence-based review of treatment for children experiencing gender distress ever undertaken – it is clear her findings support the grave concerns I and many others have raised. Central here was the lack of an evidential base of good quality that could back claims for the effectiveness of young people being prescribed puberty blockers or proceeding on a medical pathway to transition. I and many other clinicians were concerned about the risks of long-term damaging consequences of early medical intervention. Cass has already had to speak out against misinformation being spread about her review, and a Labour MP has admitted she “may have misled” Parliament when referring to it. The review should be defended from misrepresentation.

The policy of “affirmation” – that is, speedily agreeing with a child that they are of the wrong gender – was an inappropriate clinical stance brought about by influential activist groups and some senior gender identity development service (Gids) staff, resulting in a distortion of the clinical domain. Studies indicate that a majority of children in the absence of medical intervention will desist – that is, change their minds.

David Bell is a retired psychiatrist and former president of the British Psychoanalytic Society

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Teachers say behaviour getting worse as survey also shows parents getting less supportive of school policies

Only two in five children in England say they always feel safe at school, according to a government survey, and teachers from across Britain have told the Guardian they have seen pupils’ behaviour deteriorate over the last two years.

Teachers said violence and abuse aimed at school staff and other students had increased alongside displays of homophobia, racism and sexism, with women in particular bearing the brunt of aggressive sexual remarks.

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Now living in comparative freedom in Iran, 26-year-old Mahtab Eftekhar describes facing motherhood at 12 and explains why seeking justice for other women means she no longer fears death

At the age of 10, while still in the third grade, I received news from my mother and stepfather that we would travel to Helmand province for my brother’s wedding. Little did I know, it was to be my own wedding, as my family had arranged my marriage to my cousin and sold me for 40,000 Afghanis [£500], without my knowledge or consent.

That night, after the wedding, I went to sleep beside my mother and little brother, only to wake up next to my cousin. Trembling from confusion and fear, I fled the room in tears and screams. But my mother and her sister coerced me back into that room. It was then that I was told I had been married to my cousin.

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Higher rate of 15-year-old girls drinking than in other countries plus rise in 15-year-olds smoking contrasts with fewer boys drinking

In 2000, about 19% of children under 16 in England smoked, according to Action on Smoking and Health. By 2018, this had declined to 5%.

But, according to a major report by the World Health Organization released on Thursday , a third of 11-year-olds and over half of 13-year-olds had drunk alcohol, the highest number of any country worldwide. Girls were found to be more likely than boys to have drunk at 15.

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What broke me as a child was my mother’s death from breast cancer. But around that shattering, I became a person – and learned how to parent my son

I try to remember her hands. They were younger than mine are now. I imagine her long fingers and yellow, uneven and unpolished fingernails. Or had her nails fallen out? I am eight, about to turn nine; she will be dead in two weeks. Today is Mother’s Day and I am allowed to stay home alone with her while everyone else goes to church. I am to be her helper, so I carry a basket up from downstairs. I set it on her bed. She is sitting up.

I know this is meant to be our day, our time; it is the first and last time I will be alone with her in this house. But I don’t want to be here. Within weeks, she has transformed from my mother into a ghost, a skeleton; no hair, scarves covering her head. I know I am supposed to want to be with her on this day, but how can I want that? To be with a dying woman, my disappearing mother, whom I resent. It is too much. “What are you doing?”, I want to scream. “What do you expect me to do now, here without you?”

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It is perverse that adults are legally protected from violence, yet striking a child can be defended. Calls for a ban are getting louder

When a child is scared of their parents, they can spend a long time plucking up the courage to talk. I learned this during a decade of volunteering as a Childline counsellor. There is a 20-second period, in between saying your name and waiting for them to share theirs, that is the most silent the air can ever be. You could hear a pin drop or just a caller’s breath echoing on the receiver. In that moment, a young girl who has been slapped by her father is deciding whether to ask for help or to hang up and try again to form the words in a week or two.

I thought of this silence as I read calls from leading doctors to ban parents from smacking their children in England and Northern Ireland. Unlike in Scotland and Wales – where over the past four years the Victorian-era law that allows it has been overturned – it is still legal for a parent or carer to hit, smack or slap their child if it is a “reasonable” punishment.

Frances Ryan is a Guardian columnist and author of Crippled: Austerity and the Demonisation of Disabled People

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Study by World Health Organization shows more than half of children in Britain had drunk alcohol by age 13

The UK has the worst rate of child alcohol abuse worldwide, and more than half of British children have drunk alcohol by the age of 13, according to a report.

The study, one of the largest of its kind by the World Health Organization (WHO), looked at 2021-22 data on 280,000 children aged 11, 13 and 15 from 44 countries who were asked about alcohol, cigarettes and vape usage.

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Gabriel Attal says state needs ‘real surge of authority’ in speech in Viry-Châtillon, where 15-year-old killed

The French prime minister, Gabriel Attal, is facing criticism for his proposed crackdown on teenage violence in and around schools, after he said some teenagers in France were “addicted to violence”, just as the government seeks to reclaim ground on security issues from the far right before European elections.

In his speech in Viry-Châtillon, a town south of Paris where a 15-year-old boy was beaten and killed this month by a group of young people , Attal said the state needed “a real surge of authority”.

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Charity that uses football to help pupils build relationships found to improve happiness in Greater Manchester project

Intensive mentoring for troubled schoolchildren using football kickabouts has significantly increased wellbeing, delivering happiness boosts equivalent to an unemployed adult getting a job, a study has found.

A project involving more than 2,000 pupils in dozens of secondary schools in Greater Manchester showed that instead of wellbeing declining among pupils at risk of exclusion who had behavioural issues and special educational needs, their happiness scores increased.

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