Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA), home to the largest dedicated clinic that treats transgender youth in the country, is ending access to transgender healthcare.
After President Donald Trump threatened to cut federal funding to medical centers that provide gender-affirming care for transgender youth, CHLA announced its decision to shutter its gender clinic next week.
In an email to patient families, the hospital stated that there was “no viable alternative” to ending treatment for nearly 3,000 patients.
As the July 22nd closure date looms over CHLA’s Center for Transyouth Health and Development, LGBTQ+ rights groups are protesting the hospital’s “cowardly and cruel” move.
At a July 3rd rally to “Save Trans Care,” Maria Do of the Los Angeles LGBT Center, spoke to a large crowd of protesters outside of CHLA.
“We are joined by fellow advocates, leaders, elected officials, parents, and allies to call out CHLA leadership for making the wrong and illegal decision to close down its Center for Transyouth Health and Development, along with its gender affirming care program,” Do told the crowd.
Standing in front of a huge hand-painted sign that said “Protect Trans Kids,” Do shared a testimony from the parent of a transgender patient who had lost health care at the hospital. They read the testimony on behalf of the patient’s parent, who wished to remain anonymous for safety reasons.
“When we found out that CHLA was shutting down its trans youth program, a penetrating sorrow ripped through my soul. But I wasn't surprised. After all, in February, the hospital's leadership and board made the cowardly and cruel move to end puberty blockers and surgery for adolescent patients,” Do shared.
“When I spoke with Chief Medical Officer Jim Stein, what he would do to show patients, families, and the public — what the hospital would do to show their support for life-saving, gender-affirming healthcare — his answer was, “We’ll fly the trans pride flag outside the hospital one day a week.”
On the day of the rally, the trans pride flag was nowhere to be seen. CHLA did not respond to L.A. TACO’s requests for comment.
After 30 years of operation, CHLA’s gender clinic is one of the country’s oldest providers of gender-affirming healthcare for trans youth.
On CHLA’s website, the page for the Center for Transyouth Health and Development displays a statement about its impending closure.
The statement is followed by links to three different suicide prevention hotlines.
Transgender youth experience disproportionately high rates of depression when compared to their cisgender peers. They’re also significantly more likely to consider and attempt suicide, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC).
For many trans kids and young adults, gender-affirming healthcare is a lifeline that greatly lowers the rates of depression and suicidality for trans and nonbinary youths aged 13 to 20.
In response to the Trump administration’s attacks on gender-affirming care, the American Psychological Association (APA) released the following statement:
“Research clearly shows that supportive mental health care greatly reduces the risk of depression, suicide, and other negative outcomes for transgender and nonbinary youth. Psychotherapeutic treatment for transgender and nonbinary youth should aim to help children and adolescents explore and understand, rather than change, their gender identity.
Eliminating or reducing access to mental health supports for transgender, gender-diverse and nonbinary populations contradicts established psychological science and risks perpetuating harm to people whose gender identity may be different from their biological sex assigned at birth.”
With California’s shield laws in place, the right to receive reproductive and gender-affirming healthcare is supposed to be protected (at least in a normally-functioning democracy).
But on January 28, Trump issued an executive order demanding that medical institutions receiving federal funds halt gender-affirming care for trans youth under the age of 19.
When the hospital first paused gender-affirming care for patients in February, California Attorney General Rob Bonta sent CHLA a letter disputing the legality of Trump’s executive order. Bonta, alongside 22 other state Attorneys General, filed suit to stop the federal government’s “illegal efforts” to rescind funding.
He also served the hospital a pointed reminder that closing the gender clinic would break the state’s anti-discrimination law.
“As a reminder, California law, including the Unruh Civil Rights Act, Civil Code section 51, and Government Code section 11135, prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity,” Bonta’s letter states. “Electing to refuse services to a class of individuals based on their protected status, such as withholding services from transgender individuals based on their gender identity or their diagnosis of gender dysphoria, while offering such services to cisgender individuals, is discrimination.”
Despite his reassurance that families seeking trans healthcare and the doctors who provide it are protected under California state law, CHLA still decided to shutter its gender clinic.
CHLA is one of the few hospitals that provides gender-affirming care for trans youth who have public health insurance, particularly those who are low-income. Transgender patients, in general, are already underinsured when compared to their cisgender counterparts.
Since April, at least 27 states have passed legislation banning gender-affirming care for transgender children and adolescents.
Unfortunately, due to CHLA’s reliance on government funding, executives claim that they have no choice but to halt trans healthcare.
“CHLA has a responsibility to navigate this complex and uncertain regulatory environment in a way that allows us to remain open as much as possible for as many as possible,” the hospital’s email to patient families stated. “In the end, this painful and difficult decision was driven by the need to safeguard the CHLA’s ability to operate amid significant external pressures beyond our control.”
CHLA will continue to operate, and in many cases, offer the same treatments to cisgender patients that they’re no longer allowed to provide to trans patients. For example, puberty blockers and mastectomies are used to treat puberty disorders, such as precocious puberty and hormone imbalances.
Sadly, to transgender patients and their families, CHLA’s decision to close its gender clinic sends a clear message: In order to prioritize care for cisgender patients, hospital executives are more than okay with throwing trans kids under the bus.
