An NHS Scotland website published documents saying that eunuchs should be recognised as a formal gender identity, prompting an apology from officials.
Health chiefs say an investigation will be launched into how the documents were uploaded on to The National Gender Identity Clinical Network for Scotland (NGICNS).
It comes after the Daily Telegraph reported how the website shared claims from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) about ‘eunuch-identified people’.
A eunuch is a man who has been castrated. Historically eunuchs would be servants or slaves who had been castrated against their will.
They have also historically served religious roles and in some cultures engaged in espionage and clandestine work.
Famously the actor Conleth Hill played the eunuch spy master Lord Varys in the television series Game of Thrones. His character was forcibly castrated as a child.
However the term eunuch can encompass those who have been chemically or surgically castrated, including due to illness.
There are also modern eunuchs who desire to be physically castrated by choice, including those who are part of the growing ‘Nullo movement’.
It comes after police arrested seven men including a suspect in his sixties allegedly linked to a ‘bizarre’ castration cult who have intimate body parts removed live on pay per view streams all orchestrated by a ringleader nicknamed ‘The Eunuch Maker’.
It also comes amid a debate over the SNP reforms which seeks to makes the process for acquiring a gender recognition certificate (GRC) easier for trans people.
Earlier this week David Parker, a lead clinician at the NGICNS and a WPATH member, called on MSPs to the reforms.
According to reports, the NGICNS website included material from the WPATH saying ‘eunuch-identified people’ were the ‘least visible’ trans group.
But the paper was deleted on Wednesday night. The Scottish Government issued an apology, claiming it had been published by mistake.
However campaigners have reacted with fury over its inclusion on the NHS Scotland website.
Susan Smith, of the For Women Scotland campaign group, told the Telegraph: ‘We are disgusted that NHS Scotland thinks that it is appropriate to align with any organisation pushing ‘eunuch identity’, let alone host a paper about it on their website.
‘This is a barbaric practice which, for centuries, was used to demean and abuse young men and boys.’
According to the paper, the document described a eunuch as ‘an individual assigned male at birth whose testicles have been surgically removed or rendered non-functional, and who identifies as a eunuch’ and ‘individuals who feel that their true self is best expressed by the term eunuch’.
It also reportedly stated that eunuchs ‘generally desire to have their testicles surgically removed or rendered non-functional. and that ‘surgical intervention’ should be offered if withholding treatment could lead to them attempting to carry out a medical procedure themselves.