Surgeries for minors are rare and are generally not recommended by medical associations, most of which oppose broad bans on transition-related care.
Surgeries for minors are rare and are generally not recommended by medical associations, most of which oppose broad bans on transition-related care.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine announced an executive order Friday that will immediately ban transition-related surgeries for minors in the state, about a week after vetoing a bill that would have banned all gender-affirming care for minors, including puberty blockers and hormone therapy.
“A week has gone by, and I still feel just as firmly as I did that day,” DeWine said at a news conference Friday, reaffirming his decision to veto the broader ban. “I believe the parents, not the government, should be making these crucial decisions for their children.”
DeWine’s executive order makes Ohio the second state to specifically ban transition-related surgeries for minors after Arizona passed such a law in 2022.
Since 2021, more than 20 states have enacted broader transgender health care laws like the one DeWine vetoed last week. These measures restrict all gender-transition care for minors, including access to puberty blockers and hormone therapy. A judge struck down such a law in Arkansas in June, and judges have issued temporary blocks, either partial or full, against restrictions in Florida, Georgia, Montana, Idaho and Indiana.
Major medical associations — including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychological Association — support minors’ access to gender-affirming care and oppose state bans.
On the other hand, doesn’t this take the wind out of the sails of most of the anti-trans block’s arguments? With this “what-if” banned all of the remaining arguments are pretty clearly irrational, religious, or generally indefensible.
This is obviously an enormously complicated topic that there's a lot of misinformation and opinions out there on, but ultimately speaking my problem with it, other than the fact it will very obviously be applied in a discriminatory way, is that bigots don't stop pushing because you give them an inch.
I'm in no way equating the two because non-consensual surgeries on intersex kids have potential to be far more damaging, but I'm sure infant male genital mutilation will continue as well.
Gender affirming surgery is also real. It is almost never performed on minors, but can be performed on intersex minors. Except not in Ohio anymore apparently.
It's worse because most of that in the US isn't done in the name of religion but of tradition based on pseudoscience. There isn't even an invisible man excuse.
Imagine being born with ovaries but no vagina. Does that happen? I'm pretty sure the Republican plan for them would be to wait until they are dying of sepsis before taking the minimum necessary steps to keep them alive.
Of course coming right after the victory on HB68 getting shot down (thankfully!).
Because surgeries are very rare for anyone under 18, I think the bigger impact to DeWine's order is the requirement of youth or ADULTS needing to have psychiatric care AND endocrinologist involved as pre-reqs before starting any kind of medical care. This is a bigger deal because some people will be blocked by the religious therapists out there, and in smaller communities finding and endo can be hard and more expensive. This definitely hurts the trans community.