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2. The broom cupboard
As the number of people on the waiting list increases, the clinic comes under pressure
Polly Carmichael became the director of the Gender Identity Development Service at the Tavistock in 2009. 鈥淚 remember our office was literally a room that had probably been a broom cupboard at one stage鈥�, 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. The numbers of people on the waiting list ticked inexorably up, until the clinic felt it could barely cope.
