Transgender Youth Should be Protected by the Treating Physician, Not the State
The Florida Board of Medicine and the Florida Board of Osteopathic Medicine approved a ban on puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and transgender surgeries for minors, collectively known as gender-affirming care, on November 4, 2022.
Physicians found to have violated the new ruling could have their license to practice medicine revoked by the state of Florida. Florida is one of three states to have implemented measures to end gender-affirming care for adolescents with Texas going so far as to file charges against parents for child abuse.
Given that Governor Ron DeSantis appointed the members of both the Florida Board of Osteopathic Medicine and the Florida Board of Medicine, which are traditionally non-partisan, it's not surprising that these board members sided with this transphobic measure. Earlier this year, Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration declared gender-affirming treatments experimental and therefore exempt from Medicaid coverage.
The ruling is another way for Governor DeSantis to make decisions without looking at the facts and tout himself out as a Trump-style conservative.
SisterLove denounces the board's decisions on the grounds that they violate the doctor-patient right to privacy which is guaranteed by the state’s constitution and the legal right to doctor-patient confidentiality.
SisterLove also denounces this ban because it prohibits a form of treatment approved by the American Medical Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and other like-minded professional groups and a patient’s treating physician.
Florida’s decision is counter to evidenced-based findings from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regarding treatment options for children and adolescents experiencing gender dysphoria. HHS states on its website, “attempts to block parents from making critical healthcare decisions regarding their children negatively impact the health and well-being of transgender and gender nonconforming youth”. Federally affirmed care includes puberty blockers and cross-sex hormone therapy during adolescence. Transgender surgery is done on a case-by-case basis according to the HHS. All of these treatments require a parent or guardian’s consent.
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) states that one’s gender identity is one’s internal sense of who one is, which is multifaceted and stems from biological traits, developmental influences, and environmental conditions. The AAP states that gender can be stable, shifting, or fluid in some people.
One is considered transgender, according to the AAP, whose gender identity does not match their assigned sex and generally remains persistent, consistent, and insistent over time.
According to one report from the AAP, 56% of youth who identified as transgender reported previous suicidal ideation, and 31% reported a prior suicide attempt, compared with 20% and 11% among matched youth who identified as cisgender, respectively.
Where there is evidence of body dysmorphia, the AAP states there is a need for the physician, a nonjudgmental partnership with a medical group, the family, and the youth to explore complicated emotions and diverse expressions before gender-affirmative care is initiated.
SisterLove stands with the transgender community’s fight against this and similar decisions across the county as these actions are forms of oppression. States should leave body-affirming treatments in the hands of the treating physicians, the family, and the minor.
Anyone who believes that their child has been denied health care, including gender-affirming care, on the basis of the child’s identity, may file a complaint with the HHS Office for Civil Rights.
