DOJ Secures Agreements to End Transgender Care for Minors
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has come to agreements with two major healthcare systems, New York University Langone Hospitals (NYU) and University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC), to stop providing transgender medical treatments to minors.
According to a DOJ statement, both hospitals will discontinue services that include administering puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgical procedures for children. This follows an investigation into potential federal law violations related to their provision of what is often referred to as “gender-affirming care.”
As part of the resolution, NYU will pay $8.5 million while UPMC will contribute $950,000.
“The Department of Justice is fighting to protect our nation’s children and working tirelessly to reach agreements with hospitals to end so-called ‘gender affirming care’ for minors,” said Attorney General Todd Blanche. “Today’s resolutions send a clear message: hospitals that target children in these practices and then fraudulently obtain payment for the procedures will be held to account.”
In response to the announcements, members of Pittsburgh-based TransYOUniting expressed strong opposition to the agreements. One board member, Lyndsey Sickler, stated, “UPMC is not actually harming young people with gender-affirming care. There’s nothing there. It’s horrible that this government body is exerting such a controlling effort.”
Both NYU and UPMC clarified that these resolutions, including the financial penalties, should not be seen as admissions of wrongdoing. They both emphasized that the decisions were made to avoid lengthy litigation and to protect patient privacy, the integrity of their staff, and to focus on patient care.
UPMC noted its motivations behind settling, while NYU’s spokesperson Steve Ritea emphasized that the settlement does not imply guilt or wrongdoing and is meant to safeguard their patients and providers.
The DOJ acknowledged that both healthcare systems cooperated with the investigations. Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate and U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Ryan Raybould pointed out that investigations into other providers of transgender care are still ongoing.
“We appreciate that some of the nation’s largest and most prestigious hospital systems have agreed to cease harming minors under the guise of ‘gender-affirming care’ and agreed to pay for potential violations of federal law when they did so,” Shumate remarked.
Raybould added, “My office’s foremost priority is protecting children. The resolutions announced today reflect the close collaboration across the Department of Justice and our continued commitment to ensuring that minors are safeguarded.”
The agreements with NYU and UPMC follow similar arrangements with other institutions, including Mount Sinai Health System in New York and Texas Children’s Hospital. The federal government is also attempting to limit transgender care at Rady Children’s Hospital in California, though the state’s Attorney General has filed a lawsuit to compel the hospital to continue such care, excluding surgeries, until the legal matter is resolved.
Interestingly, NYU had announced the closure of its transgender care programs back in February, but it appears the official closure was finalized only after the DOJ’s intervention.
