‘Gender-affirming Care For Our Trans Kids’: Pelosi Backs Healthcare for Transgender Youth
Medical providers are capitulating to Trump’s executive order
The last Democrat to lead the US House is publicly backing the availability of gender-affirming healthcare for the nation’s transgender youth, while medical providers have been pausing — or outright walking away from — offering such care.
Rep Nancy Pelosi, of California, spoke out after one of her state’s largest health care providers said it will stop providing gender-affirming care to transgender minors.
Kaiser Permanente and others made the decision as a result of actions taken by Donald Trump and his administration to rollback the rights of transgender Americans.
Trump issued an executive order on his first day in office denying the existence of transgender people, and his administration has been taking actions to further that position ever since.
Pelosi, who led the House for several years under three presidents — including Trump’s first term — was asked about the matter during a visit to a Veterans Administration hospital.
Transgender folks rely on a variety of healthcare for their needs, which has become politicized by Republicans in recent years.
This politicization comes despite the fact that estimates put the number of transgender Americans no more than 1.6 percent of the total population, and just 300,000 transgender youth are thought to live in the United States.
Research shows that rates of regret for gender-affirming procedures are extremely low — estimates are around 1 percent. Rates of regret for knee and hip replacement surgeries are much higher than gender affirmation surgery, according to studies.
“Well, that is something that I’m working for at the national level. And we have — I’m going to say — are hoping that we can have gender-affirming care for our trans kids, and that — it’s a sad thing for us,” Pelosi said. “I don’t know what effect we can have nationally with what we have going on in the White House and in the Congress.
“It’s really very sad, if you were there. Outside our door, we have a trans flag. Outside of our door in the office, the congressional office building, we have the trans flag, as do some of our other colleagues, but that view is not necessarily shared by people on the other side of the aisle,” she added. “So, it is — it’s a challenge and we have to work through it and we have to have people work through it. It sends a terrible message to trans kids.”
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