This is a conservative estimate from a new, comprehensive analysis of insurance-claims data by the advocacy nonprofit Do No Harm, which opposes such treatment for minors.
I had a feeling CHOP would be on those lists, as well as HUP, and there they were. Not the kind of distinction you want to win.
Proponents of gender ideology seem almost totally unaware of how they come across to normies. I mean, back in the 80s and 90s, conservatives (absurdly) accused gays of trying to convert children, but those accusations vis a vis gender are much, much more credible. There actually are people whose job it is to help children think they are the opposite sex, and to use drugs and surgery to make that notion seem credible.
They also use a comparison to gay conversion therapy to cancel therapists that question a child’s claim they’re transgender. They say the therapist is gatekeeping. It scares therapists into avoiding those clients or just affirming them. It’s how they cancelled Kenneth Zucker (he later won a lawsuit about it).
What a fascinating and helpful resource. As someone who does data work in the public health I can appreciate how much work went into putting something like this together. Just incredible work on Do No Harm's Part.
I do have a mild criticism with Do No Harm, though. While I understand on an emotional level why they use they language they do in reference to "Gender Affirming Care", I think it gets in the way of it being taken seriously by the people whose minds need to change for these practices to stop; normie center lefties who have been protected from the information on GAC that would probably change their minds (me before I "peaked" earlier this year). I suspect most of these folks, if they somehow learn of this project at all, will encounter that language and immediately discredit the entire project as right wing propaganda. I'll be honest, this time last year I would have too. This seems to me to be something of an own goal on Do No Harm's part; I'm sure it would have been just as easy to use more neutral sounding language while losing none of the rigor or quality of the work. And it may well have increased its reach and influence.
As Littlejo notes, providers aren't always truthful about the diagnoses they submit to insurers. I vaguely recall a recent story about gender surgeries being coded as non-gender-related to make sure that they were covered (e.g., breast reduction instead of mastectomy). Do you think that some are being missed in this data set for that reason?
Do No Harm released a podcast interview this morning with the person who led this project. She addressed this directly. In short, they are very aware of this phenomenon, but I took her answer to mean that in the interest of keeping the numbers focused only on those services they could confidently say were relayed to GAC, miscoded services are not included.
"Gorton said that if, for instance, a transgender man wanted a hysterectomy but his insurance didn’t cover gender-affirming care, Gorton would enter the ICD-10 code for pelvic pain, as opposed to gender dysphoria, into the patient’s billing record."
"When Dr. Eric Meininger, an internist and pediatrician at Indiana University Health’s Gender Health Program, treats a trans kid seeking hormone therapy, he commonly uses the ICD-10 code for “medication management” as the primary reason for the patient’s visit."
And here's a handy table you can use to disguise the true nature of the care you're providing:
I think the story you're referring to is one that Christopher Rufo had a lengthy post on.
"Yesterday, I published an investigative report featuring a Texas Children’s Hospital whistleblower, who alleged that doctors in the hospital’s child sex-change program have committed Medicaid fraud."
Though I'm rather "peeved" about Rufo's too-common use of the phrase "sex-change". Particularly without being bracketed by flashing neon scare quotes -- absolutely no one, no human in any case, changes sex.
A majorly problematic part or the whole transgender clusterfuck -- excuse my French -- is the ubiquity of various transgender nutcases, and their useful and useless idiots in biology and philosophy, who dogmatically and dementedly insist that is possible. For a damning bill of particulars, see:
"Is it really true that 'no one's denying the reality of biological sex'? There seems to be a lot of people doing that thing that 'no one' is doing"
I don't think I saw an article about this, but did hear the whistleblower on Gender A Wider Lens (https://www.widerlenspod.com/p/episode-186). That may be where I heard about the coding fraud.
Yes, Dr. Ethan Haim blew the whistle at a Texas hospital and was served by the DOJ. In an interview with Peter Boghossian, he revealed that doctors were falsifying Medicare forms. For example, when prescribing testosterone to a girl, the doctor would list her as ‘male’ to ensure coverage, as testosterone isn’t typically covered for females. I believe once this practice is fully exposed in Texas, it will become clear that it was happening on a broader scale. That’s why there’s an effort to silence him—this could uncover widespread harm to children, funded by taxpayer dollars.
Why is Female Genital Mutilation carried out? FGM is carried out for various cultural, religious and social reasons within families and communities in the mistaken belief that it will benefit the girl in some way (for example, as a preparation for marriage or to preserve her virginity).
Americans have strong feeling against the barbaric practice of FGM, but in the countries where it’s done they think it benefits the girl. Imagine criticizing parents in Somalia for surgery of the clitoris and labia while we’ll do a hysterectomy, mastectomy, and provide medication to prevent puberty. I wonder what they say about our progressive, affirming, Western values.
Do any readers know if there is an equivalent resource for the UK, ie that shows numbers and details of medicalized gender transitions for minors in the UK?
The best we have is Appendix 8 of the Cass Review. Make sure to carefully read the limitations of that data set, which covers only about 1/3 of all GIDS patients.
Is this peak capitalism? Unnecessary medical procedures that destroy the ability of the recipient to reproduce. The particular kind of child being left infertile is clearly not of importance to those running the system. How is this not eugenics?
I had a feeling CHOP would be on those lists, as well as HUP, and there they were. Not the kind of distinction you want to win.
Proponents of gender ideology seem almost totally unaware of how they come across to normies. I mean, back in the 80s and 90s, conservatives (absurdly) accused gays of trying to convert children, but those accusations vis a vis gender are much, much more credible. There actually are people whose job it is to help children think they are the opposite sex, and to use drugs and surgery to make that notion seem credible.
They also use a comparison to gay conversion therapy to cancel therapists that question a child’s claim they’re transgender. They say the therapist is gatekeeping. It scares therapists into avoiding those clients or just affirming them. It’s how they cancelled Kenneth Zucker (he later won a lawsuit about it).
What a fascinating and helpful resource. As someone who does data work in the public health I can appreciate how much work went into putting something like this together. Just incredible work on Do No Harm's Part.
I do have a mild criticism with Do No Harm, though. While I understand on an emotional level why they use they language they do in reference to "Gender Affirming Care", I think it gets in the way of it being taken seriously by the people whose minds need to change for these practices to stop; normie center lefties who have been protected from the information on GAC that would probably change their minds (me before I "peaked" earlier this year). I suspect most of these folks, if they somehow learn of this project at all, will encounter that language and immediately discredit the entire project as right wing propaganda. I'll be honest, this time last year I would have too. This seems to me to be something of an own goal on Do No Harm's part; I'm sure it would have been just as easy to use more neutral sounding language while losing none of the rigor or quality of the work. And it may well have increased its reach and influence.
As Littlejo notes, providers aren't always truthful about the diagnoses they submit to insurers. I vaguely recall a recent story about gender surgeries being coded as non-gender-related to make sure that they were covered (e.g., breast reduction instead of mastectomy). Do you think that some are being missed in this data set for that reason?
Do No Harm released a podcast interview this morning with the person who led this project. She addressed this directly. In short, they are very aware of this phenomenon, but I took her answer to mean that in the interest of keeping the numbers focused only on those services they could confidently say were relayed to GAC, miscoded services are not included.
Good to know!
Here's an article that goes into some detail about the lying that doctors resort to:
https://kffhealthnews.org/news/article/medical-coding-creates-barriers-to-care-for-transgender-patients/
"Gorton said that if, for instance, a transgender man wanted a hysterectomy but his insurance didn’t cover gender-affirming care, Gorton would enter the ICD-10 code for pelvic pain, as opposed to gender dysphoria, into the patient’s billing record."
"When Dr. Eric Meininger, an internist and pediatrician at Indiana University Health’s Gender Health Program, treats a trans kid seeking hormone therapy, he commonly uses the ICD-10 code for “medication management” as the primary reason for the patient’s visit."
And here's a handy table you can use to disguise the true nature of the care you're providing:
https://southernequality.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/InsuranceCoding.pdf
I would think that these kinds of shenanigans would make it impossible to gather accurate data on who's getting what treatment.
I think the story you're referring to is one that Christopher Rufo had a lengthy post on.
"Yesterday, I published an investigative report featuring a Texas Children’s Hospital whistleblower, who alleged that doctors in the hospital’s child sex-change program have committed Medicaid fraud."
https://christopherrufo.com/p/texas-childrens-hospital-now-under?utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true
Though I'm rather "peeved" about Rufo's too-common use of the phrase "sex-change". Particularly without being bracketed by flashing neon scare quotes -- absolutely no one, no human in any case, changes sex.
A majorly problematic part or the whole transgender clusterfuck -- excuse my French -- is the ubiquity of various transgender nutcases, and their useful and useless idiots in biology and philosophy, who dogmatically and dementedly insist that is possible. For a damning bill of particulars, see:
"Is it really true that 'no one's denying the reality of biological sex'? There seems to be a lot of people doing that thing that 'no one' is doing"
https://speakingplainly.substack.com/p/is-it-really-true-that-no-ones-denying?triedRedirect=true
Rufo is just contributing to that problem with his careless use of the phrase.
I don't think I saw an article about this, but did hear the whistleblower on Gender A Wider Lens (https://www.widerlenspod.com/p/episode-186). That may be where I heard about the coding fraud.
Yes, Dr. Ethan Haim blew the whistle at a Texas hospital and was served by the DOJ. In an interview with Peter Boghossian, he revealed that doctors were falsifying Medicare forms. For example, when prescribing testosterone to a girl, the doctor would list her as ‘male’ to ensure coverage, as testosterone isn’t typically covered for females. I believe once this practice is fully exposed in Texas, it will become clear that it was happening on a broader scale. That’s why there’s an effort to silence him—this could uncover widespread harm to children, funded by taxpayer dollars.
Can you explain the reasoning for only counting prescriptions entered within 90 days of a GD diagnosis?
Because they want to be sure that the medication prescription was tied to the GD diagnosis and was not for some other purpose.
Aha, thank you.
Why is Female Genital Mutilation carried out? FGM is carried out for various cultural, religious and social reasons within families and communities in the mistaken belief that it will benefit the girl in some way (for example, as a preparation for marriage or to preserve her virginity).
Americans have strong feeling against the barbaric practice of FGM, but in the countries where it’s done they think it benefits the girl. Imagine criticizing parents in Somalia for surgery of the clitoris and labia while we’ll do a hysterectomy, mastectomy, and provide medication to prevent puberty. I wonder what they say about our progressive, affirming, Western values.
Do any readers know if there is an equivalent resource for the UK, ie that shows numbers and details of medicalized gender transitions for minors in the UK?
The best we have is Appendix 8 of the Cass Review. Make sure to carefully read the limitations of that data set, which covers only about 1/3 of all GIDS patients.
Is this peak capitalism? Unnecessary medical procedures that destroy the ability of the recipient to reproduce. The particular kind of child being left infertile is clearly not of importance to those running the system. How is this not eugenics?
I'm pretty sure that the analysis included endo disorder NOS.