Trump admin bars federal employee insurance from covering gender-affirming care - LGBTQ Nation

Federal employees are now fully barred from gender-affirming medical care under health insurance programs, with no exceptions. Updated guidance from the Trump administration requires health insurance carriers to remove any exceptions process for coverage of excluded services for members who are mid-treatment within surgical and/or hormonal regimens for diagnosed gender dysphoria. Previously, the Office of Personnel Management instructed insurers not to offer coverage, but included a case-by-case exception that allowed trans employees mid-treatment to continue care. That exception helped prevent de-transitioning and protected people who had undergone procedures removing organs that produced birth hormones, since stopping hormone treatment could cause serious health problems. Federal employees could seek private insurance, but costs and compensation structures often make that difficult.

"Federal employees will now be fully barred from gender-affirming care under their health insurance programs, with no exceptions. The Trump administration has just updated their guidance for health insurance companies who want to provide plans to federal employees and have removed language that had previously allowed for exceptions."

"The new directive states that "carriers must remove any exceptions process ... for coverage of excluded services for members who are mid-treatment within a surgical and/or hormonal regimen for diagnosed gender dysphoria.""

"The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) previously issued a letter last August which instructed health insurers not to offer gender-affirming care coverage for federal employees. However, the exceptions that it included allowed for a "case-by-case basis" approach which would enable trans federal employees who were "mid-treatment within a surgical and/or hormonal regimen for diagnosed gender dysphoria.""

"That exception was important to prevent people from being de-transitioned. But it was even more important in the case of trans people who had undergone procedures to remove the organs that produced their birth hormones, for whom stopping hormone treatment could cause drastic health problems."

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