Medical experts rebuke ‘unscientific claims’ behind Florida effort to deny Medicaid coverage for gender-affirming care
Story at a glance
Medical experts have challenged claims from Florida health officials that treatments for gender dysphoria “are not consistent with generally accepted professional medical standards.”
A team of scientists and a law professor from Yale Law School, the Yale School of Medicine, the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center (UTSMC) and the University of Alabama at Birmingham in a report published this month said the state’s position is “thoroughly flawed and lacking scientific weight.”
Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration in June published a notice for a proposed rule that would eliminate coverage for gender-affirming health care.
Medical experts are challenging claims from Florida health officials that standards of care for transgender medicine do not meet generally accepted medical standards for Medicaid coverage.
In a report published this month by a team of seven scientists and a law professor from Yale Law School, the Yale School of Medicine, the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center (UTSMC) and the University of Alabama at Birmingham, experts argue that the state of Florida’s position is “thoroughly flawed and lacking scientific weight.”
In June, Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA), which controls most of its Medicaid program, published a notice for a proposed rule to eliminate coverage for gender-affirming health care.
Under the rule, Florida’s Medicaid program would exclude coverage for puberty blockers, hormones, gender-affirming surgeries or “any other procedures that alter primary or secondary sexual characteristics” when those interventions are used to treat gender dysphoria.
America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news.
Earlier that month, the AHCA released a report asserting that some treatments for gender dysphoria “are not consistent with generally accepted professional medical standards,” and are “experimental and investigational with the potential for harmful long term [e]ffects.”
The agency in its report pointed to several scientific studies supporting hormone therapy, puberty blockers and gender-affirming surgery, finding them to be “weak to very weak.”
Scientists at Yale, UTSMC and the University of Alabama said the agency’s characterization of medical treatments for gender dysphoria as “experimental” is “demonstrably false,” referencing longstanding clinical practice guidelines from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) and The Endocrine Society.
Evidence used to support the agency’s position is also unpublished and non-peer reviewed, researchers said – a violation of the state’s standards for determining medical necessity.
“We are alarmed that Florida’s health care agency has adopted a purportedly scientific report that so blatantly violates the basic tenets of scientific inquiry,” researchers wrote in the report.
“So repeated and fundamental are the errors in the Florida document that it seems clear that the report is not a serious scientific analysis but, rather, a document crafted to serve a political agenda,” they added in a statement.
A hearing in Tallahassee on the AHCA’s proposed rule last week drew a large crowd of people, many of whom represented religious groups including the Christian Family Coalition, whose founder during the hearing called gender-affirming care a “crime against humanity.”
After a pediatrician and physician testified against the rule, which they said misrepresented mainstream science, crowd members called them “groomers,” questioned their professional credentials and said their medical licenses should be taken away.
The AHCA did not immediately respond to Changing America’s request for comment.
For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
