This archive report was first published on 14 June 2020.
On June 14, 2020, the Department of Health and Human Services proposed a rule that sparked widespread concern among health care advocates. The rule aimed to erase transgender rights, leaving many to wonder about their experiences with doctors.
As one doctor, Terry McDole, put it, “The issue is not providing patient care, but whether or not the government can coerce me into abandoning my ethical commitments and medical judgment and force me to participate in certain controversial procedures and prescriptions.”
However, nearly all the nation’s medical organizations, as well as insurance groups, objected to the final rule. Matt Eyles, president and chief executive of America’s Health Insurance Plans, stated, “Health insurance providers will continue to work with other health care leaders to eliminate barriers that stand between Americans who identify as a member of the L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. community and their better health.”
Dr. Susan R. Bailey, president of the American Medical Association, emphasized that the organization’s longstanding policy bars discrimination based on race, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or a woman’s decisions about pregnancy, including termination.
Despite the outpouring of support from medical groups, some legal experts cautioned that the protections once endowed under the Affordable Care Act would themselves need protecting in order to last. Elizabeth Sepper, a law professor at the University of Texas, noted, “A huge contribution of the A.C.A. was to prohibit, for the first time, sex discrimination in health care. This rule not only narrows what is considered sex discrimination, it also narrows who has to comply with anti-sex-discrimination policy.”
