Rep. McDermott say new bill forces all insurance policy holders to pay the tab for sex-change surgery.

News Release from Office of Rep Bob McDermott, April 26, 2016

H.B. NO. 2084 is severely misrepresented and misunderstood among legislators and our whole community. This bill, which passed final reading today, is innocuously labeled as a bill “relating to insurance.” While represented as a bill to eliminate discrimination against transgendered folks, it actually forces health insurance companies to pay for various sex change procedures; of course the rest of the insured bear the cost burden for these elective procedures.

Those who crafted this bill point to its urgency for transgender individuals, asserting that transgender people are routinely denied access to medical care that is covered by health insurance providers for other individuals only because they are transgender. This language in support of H.B. NO. 2084 conjures up images of a transgender individual approaching the emergency room with a broken arm and the medical team determining not to treat them because they are transgender. This is at odds with reality.

Its primary purpose, they say, is to give equal coverage to necessary medical care, like setting a broken bone, to transgender individuals. This is not what this bill is about.

This bill would require a health insurance provider to cover any surgical procedure if the insurance covers that service for an individual for reasons not related to gender transition. Under this proposed law, the provider would be required to cover surgery for individuals seeking gender transitioning treatments. Also, if health care services are ordinarily or exclusively available to individuals of one sex, these services must be also available to anyone.

Here are some examples: If a health insurance provider covers a certain vaginoplasty service for a woman, it would be required to provide that vaginoplasty for a man seeking a gender transition treatment. Or, if a health insurance company covers mastectomies for women who have breast cancer, would now be required to provide coverage for a woman seeking a mastectomy in relation to her gender transition process.

Rep. Bob McDermott said he believes it is extraordinarily cruel to treat a mental disorder with a physical solution. McDermott points to Dr. Paul McHugh the former psychiatrist in chief for John Hopkins (the originator of all sex change surgery in the U.S. that no longer executes the procedure.) He said that transgenderism is a "mental disorder" that merits treatment, that sex change is "biologically impossible" and that people who promote sexual reassignment surgery “are collaborating with and promoting a mental disorder.”

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Dr Paul McHugh: Transgenderism: A Pathogenic Meme

HB2084: Text, Status