By Gabrielle M. Etzel. Media: Washingtonexaminer
Senior Biden administration health officials pressured an international group of medical experts to remove age limit guidelines for transgender surgeries on minors, according to newly revealed court documents.
Email excerpts from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health document how Assistant Secretary for Health at the Department of Health and Human Services Rachel Levine‘s staff pressed the organization to drop age requirements for minors to obtain gender transition surgeries in the group’s September 2022 Standards of Care update.
The documents were revealed as evidence from one of the multiple lawsuits lawsuits across the country regarding state-level bans on gender transition medical treatments for minors.
The emails were submitted as evidence in the Alabama case Boe v. Marshall by James Cantor, a psychologist and an outspoken critic of gender transition for minors.
One excerpt from an unnamed WPATH member recounts a conversation with Levine’s chief of staff, Sarah Boateng, in which she said Levine “is confident, based on the rhetoric she is hearing in D.C., and from what we have already seen, that these specific listings of ages, under 18, will result in devastating legislation for trans care,” asking for the age limits to be removed from the final draft.
Several other emails document WPATH members discussing Levine’s suggestion that age limit recommendations be given in a “less visible” document and concern that delaying publication of the document was “proving a barrier to optimal policy progress.”
Draft guidelines from WPATH published in 2021 recommended establishing age minimums of 14 for hormonal treatments, 15 for mastectomies, 16 for breast augmentation and facial reconstruction, and 17 for genital reconstruction and hysterectomy. These were ultimately removed from the final draft.
More than 20 states since 2021 have implemented some form of age restriction on gender transition for minors, citing a dearth of long-term evidence for the efficacy of reducing adverse mental health conditions.
Most adolescents with gender dysphoria who pursue medical transition are treated with hormonal replacement therapy or puberty blockers, but there have been several high-profile cases of teenagers who underwent surgeries to complete a medical transition and subsequently detransitioned upon reaching adulthood.
Many critics of gender transition for minors, including those who have medically transitioned as teenagers, highlight that adolescents have not reached the age of maturity by which to consent to life-altering medical procedures. Critics also highlight that genital surgeries and long-term cross-hormone therapy can permanently damage future fertility.
Levine, a biological male who identifies as a woman, underwent a medical gender transition in 2011 after having been married and fathering two children. In 2019, Levine expressed having “no regrets” about transitioning later in life, after having had children.
The Supreme Court announced Monday that it would take up a challenge by the Biden administration to Tennessee’s law that restricts both surgeries and hormonal treatments for minors, marking the first time that the high court will weigh in on medical transitions for minors.