Don’t Forget The ACA!

A lot of times we get turned down by insurance companies, then we have the states that ban healthcare for us well we have a big weapon at our hands the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare).

Transgender insureds can sue over health plan exclusion, U.S. appeals court affirms
In 2018, the North Carolina State Health Plan decided to exclude all coverage for gender dysphoria counseling, hormone therapy and other transition-related treatment.
NBC News
By Reuters
September 3, 2021


Transgender people who are enrolled in the North Carolina State Health Plan can proceed with a lawsuit over its 2018 decision to exclude all coverage for gender dysphoria counseling, hormone therapy, surgical care or other treatment, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held Wednesday.

The 2-1 decision affirmed a federal judge in Greensboro’s 2020 ruling that NCSHP lacks sovereign immunity from the suit, which was filed by Lambda Legal Defense & Education Fund, the Transgender Legal Defense & Education Fund, and Harris, Wiltshire & Grannis on behalf of seven state workers or their dependents under the antidiscrimination provisions of the Affordable Care Act.

NCSHP waived its 11th Amendment protections against the discrimination lawsuit by accepting federal funds, Chief Circuit Judge Roger Gregory wrote for the majority.

If a medical care provider accepts federal funds that they cannot discriminate against us. There are exceptions and you probably have guessed the exception – religious hospitals.

Religious health care providers win injunction on ACA rules
The providers feared the Biden administration would interpret the Affordable Care Act as requiring them to perform abortions and gender-affirming procedures.
NBC News
By The Associated Press
August 16, 2021


A federal judge has issued a permanent injunction on behalf of religious health care providers who feared the Biden administration would interpret the Affordable Care Act as requiring them to perform abortions or gender-transition treatment against their conscience.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services had argued that it doesn't require religious providers to offer such procedures and has never brought or threatened any enforcement activity against a religious entity in such a case.

But U.S. District Court Judge Reed O’Connor interpreted HHS regulations as forcing the plaintiffs — a Catholic hospital system in the Midwest and a Christian medical association — to choose between their beliefs and their livelihood, resulting in “irreparable injury.”

The decision underscores a continued dispute between conservative religious health care providers and HHS over an issue that has generated a patchwork of rulings that will likely have to be sorted out by appellate courts.

Connecticut has some of the most protective laws still exempt religious institutions. When I was an intern at a non-profits that advocate for women, I was tasked with what would the alternatives be if a hospital in Waterbury was bought by a religious organization, what I found was used in testimony against the buyout. I found that if a women lived in Waterbury and the hospital shutdown the fertility clinic then a women who had no personal transportation would have to travel by bus all day to an appointment at another hospital. The sale fell through when the state said that the new buyer could not close any of the clinics.

Of course all the laws will not prevent bias.

Nearly half of trans people have been mistreated by medical providers, report finds
The onus of addressing discrimination against transgender people should fall on medical institutions, one of the report’s authors said.
NBC News
By Jo Yurcaba
August 18, 2021


[…]
CAP’s [Center for American Progress] report found that nearly half of transgender people — and 68 percent of transgender people of color — reported having experienced mistreatment at the hands of a medical provider, including refusal of care and verbal or physical abuse, in the year before the survey, which took place in June 2020.

Discrimination can then prevent people from seeking future care, the survey found: 28 percent of transgender people, including 22 percent of transgender people of color, reported having postponed or not gotten necessary medical care for fear of discrimination.
[…]
The CAP report said harassment and discrimination “contribute to high rates of stress,” and — along with social determinants of health — make trans people “more likely to experience poor health outcomes.”

People will read about health disparities among trans people “and just think of that as something that, horribly, is associated with just like being trans, but actually a lot of these experiences have to do with being trans in a world that is constantly oppressing you and where you’re experiencing discrimination both interpersonally but also institutionally and in these broader systems,” said one of the report’s authors, Caroline Medina, a policy analyst at CAP.

I have been lucky so far in that my doctors have been very supportive. I only had one doctor that I felt uncomfortable with. So remember ACA can be used to fight healthcare discrimination along with state laws

When you have to go to an emergency room it is a crap shoot on how you will be treated.