Transgender rights have recently been attacked by new policies introduced by President Donald Trump’s new administration.
From transgender athletes getting banned from women’s sports to enforcing an updated legal definition of the term “sex,” there have been notable changes in politics impacting the LGBTQ+ community in the last few weeks. But what are the implications for healthcare?
Rhea Debussy, former Ph.D. student at the University of Connecticut and current director of external affairs at Equitas Health Ohio, a nonprofit healthcare system that serves the LGBTQ+ community, spoke with students and faculty at UConn on Wednesday, Feb. 19 to discuss this issue.
“The Trump administration is very erratic in how it moves,” said Debussy, who added that this can make predictions about the future difficult to make.
To provide background to her presentation, Debussy explained the premise of the Affordable Care Act (AFA), also known as “Obamacare.” The AFA was created to help middle and lower-class people get healthcare. It is also the only piece of federal legislation that provides protections to transgender related healthcare and insurance access, according to Debussy, who specialized in LGBTQ+ policy.
During the Obama administration, significant progress was made for transgender rights. This includes the AFA and the renewed conditions of Title IX of the 14th Amendment, which prohibits sex discrimination, to also prevent discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. This ensures equal protection under the law despite having different identities.
However, the Trump administration has already redefined the term “sex” to strictly reference male and female body parts at birth. This definition may impact Title IX, according to Debussy.
The new definition “does have an implication because it lets us know how the Trump administration is going to be arguing these cases,” said Debussy.
Debussy also explained how Trump also sent out an executive order prohibiting federal funds from helping people under the age of 19 receive gender affirming care, which is typically prescriptions and hormones, not surgeries.
In his first administration, Trump had only begun to act on transgender-related topics well into his term in office, with the first of healthcare related regulations coming out about a year and a half into his presidency, Debussy said. However, in his second term, Trump took action on his very first day as the president.
“I definitely learned a lot more about the legal side of everything with healthcare as somebody who wants to go into healthcare,” said Maddie Westover, a second-semester allied health science major. “The topic definitely impacts my life as lot as somebody who does identify as a trans individual, but even as somebody who lives a life surrounded by a bunch of people who identify as queer. It is a very scary world and learning about all of this stuff has really impacted my life.”
Debussy made serval predictions of what else the Trump administration may try to do to regulate the lives of queer people.
Based on evidence and the past, Debussy’s best prediction is that a new federal rule regarding transgender care either specifically in the AFA or in general will be produced. She saw the trajectory of how workplace definitions of sex discrimination had been changed through the administrations of Obama, Trump and Biden, and thinks that healthcare laws will follow a similar trajectory.
“These thoughts have always been in the back of my mind,” said a student who attended the event. “What if I cannot transition? What if I cannot live the life that I want? What if access to things like hormone therapy and gender affirming care surgeries are limited? Thise things are fears that have lived in the back of my mind but now they are being dredged to the forefront. They’re being dragged out and it is terrifying. It is scary.”