By Ahmed Aboulenein
WASHINGTON, Jan 7 (Reuters) – The Trump administration has agreed not to issue notices of exclusion from Medicare or Medicaid to providers offering gender-affirming care to children while a lawsuit from Democratic-led states challenging its restrictions proceeds, a court filing shows.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services moved last month to cut children’s access to gender-affirming care when it proposed rules barring hospitals that deliver such care from Medicare and Medicaid programs and prohibiting Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program from paying for it.
The move marked one of the Trump administration’s most sweeping restrictions yet on transgender healthcare. It formed part of a wider crackdown on the rights of transgender people through the elimination of legal protections in the military, healthcare, education and the workplace.
U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said when announcing the proposed rules that his department found that providing this type of care to children was out of compliance with the standards of healthcare, contradicting the nation’s largest medical organizations.
A group of Democratic state attorneys general shortly after filed a lawsuit in Oregon federal court disputing HHS’s findings and saying the proposed rules were unlawful attempts to dictate medical standards, intimidate health providers, and strip states of their authority to regulate medicine.
A court filing dated January 6 outlines a joint agreement on briefing deadlines, under which HHS agreed not to issue exclusion notices until the court rules on a motion for summary judgment or 30 days after any such hearing.
“This agreement brings clarity for patients, families, and providers,” Jennifer Levi, Senior Director of Transgender and Queer Rights at GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders, known as GLAD Law, said in a statement.
“HHS has committed that, while this litigation proceeds, it will not initiate Medicare exclusion actions against hospitals providing transgender health care.”
Under the briefing schedule, HHS is set to file its response and any cross-motion by February 10, while plaintiffs must submit replies and responses by March 3. Defendants may then reply in support of a cross-motion by March 24.
(Reporting by Ahmed Aboulenein; Editing by Nia Williams)
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