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Trump Administration Removes Transgender Health Discrimination Protections

by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – The US Department of Health published a new rule Friday asserting that protection against “sex discrimination” in health care applies only to people who are biologically male or female. Focussed on Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act, the final rule rolls back an Obama-era regulation which had added “gender identity” as grounds under which a person could suffer health care discrimination. Religious and conservative groups have welcomed the rule as protecting freedom of conscience and allowing federally funded medical practitioners and insurance companies to refuse the provision or coverage of transgender treatments. However, human rights groups are concerned the rule will leave trans-Americans without access to standard needed health care that is unrelated to sex change.

In the first instance, the lengthy new rule eliminates protections for trans-people instituted by the Obama administration. The Department said it is reverting back to applying Congress approved discrimination grounds: sex, race, color, national origin, age and disability, but not gender identity.

Under the Obama administration, sex discrimination was defined to encompass discrimination on the basis of gender identity – defined as “an individual’s internal sense of gender, which may be male, female, neither, or a combination of male and female.” Explaining the rolling back of gender identity as a category, the drafters of the new rule wrote: “Distinctions based on real differences between men and women do not turn into discrimination merely because an individual objects to those distinctions.”

Civil rights groups are concerned the new rule could be interpreted and used to block trans-people from accessing health care of any kind. In an interview with NPR, Lindsey Dawson, associate director of HIV policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation said a transgender person could, for example, be refused care for a check-up at a doctor’s office. Other possible scenarios, NPR reported, “include a transgender man being denied treatment for ovarian cancer, or a hysterectomy not being covered by an insurer — or costing more when the procedure is related to someone’s gender transition.”

In regards to their right to access health care, health department civil rights chief Roger Severino said trans people will continue to be protected by other statutes that prohibit health care discrimination on the grounds of race, color, national origin, age, disability and other factors. “The Department respects the dignity of all individuals,” the rule drafters wrote. “It seeks to further the health and well-being of all, but it can do so only by implementing the laws as adopted by Congress.” Nevertheless, a number of
organizations have reportedly said they will challenge the new rule and the Human Rights Campaign announced it would file a lawsuit against the government.