The Ick Factor Wins

The courts have decided to go by the “Ick Factor” rather what is medically necessary.

U.S. Supreme Court rejects transgender inmate’s appeal for sex change surgery
LGBTQ Nation
By Mark Pratt | Associated Press
Monday, May 4, 2015

A nearly two-decade legal fight by a convicted murderer in Massachusetts to get taxpayer-funded sex-reassignment surgery ended in failure Monday when the U.S. Supreme Court rejected her final appeal.

The justices did not comment in letting stand a lower-court ruling denying the surgery to Michelle Kosilek.

“This is a terrible and inhumane result for Michelle,” said Jennifer Levi, director of the Transgender Rights Project for Boston-based Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders.

The history of the case began in 2005,

The prisons department initially provided hormone treatments, electrolysis to remove facial and body hair, female clothing and personal items, but Kosilek sued again in 2005, arguing that the surgery was a medical necessity and denial of the surgery was making her suicidal. Her lawyers say she has twice tried to kill herself behind bars.

A federal judge in 2012 ordered the Department of Correction to grant the surgery, finding that it was the “only adequate treatment” for her gender-identity disorder. It was the first time a federal judge ordered such surgery.

But the state appealed and that ruling was overturned in December by the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in a 3-2 decision, so Kosilek’s lawyers turned to the Supreme Court.

As the article points out this goes against all medical research which has shown that surgery is beneficial to the health of the trans person and I think instead caters to the “Ick Factor” of the surgery.

Also the effort that the Massachusetts Department of Correction cost millions of dollars to fight this case all for a $50,000 surgery, they probably spend enough on appealing the case to pay for hundreds of surgeries.