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Insurance cut for gender-affirming care ‘sends such a negative signal’
The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners has posted an article by Anastasia Tsirtsakis(29 May ’23)
Last month, Dr Clara Tuck Meng Soo received correspondence from MDA National, one of Australia’s leading medical insurers, informing her that she would no longer be covered to initiate gender-affirming treatment for patients aged 18 and under.
‘It was very disappointing,’ she told newsGP, amid fears of its impact on the mental wellbeing of young people.
‘It is already so difficult for people to get appointments to see practitioners who actually work in this area.’
The insurance provider updated its policy, effective 1 July, earlier this month to exclude cover for claims that arise in any way out of:
a practitioner’s assessment that a patient under the age of 18 years is suitable for gender transition
a practitioner initiating prescribing of gender affirming hormones for any patient under the age of 18 years.Dr Soo writes:
‘I actually rang up the manager at MDA National [and] … queried her as to why they were taking this step because I don’t know of any evidence around the world to show that people who are initiated on gender affirming treatment between the ages of 16 and 18 are actually more likely to engage in litigation,’ she said.
‘She admitted that there wasn’t actually enough data to have firm statistical data to say that this is a problem; her response was “Oh, well, you know, we are aware of six cases happening around the world – one of which is in Australia where matters are before the court – so we want to take pre-emptive action to protect our members”.
‘Six cases around the world? Plastic surgeons and cosmetic physicians are currently being sued left, right and centre – why don’t you stop covering them?
Dr Gannon believes that the data on low levels of regret is unreliable, claiming it is not reflective of the current social context.
‘Now, most people with school aged children would know of at least one individual that is questioning or querying,’ he said.
‘In other words, this social issue has fundamentally changed in recent years from being one that was most uncommon to one which is widely considered by a larger group of people. And so, the data on people changing their minds in the experience we have probably doesn’t reflect the level of risk there is now with literally hundreds of teens questioning or querying their gender identity.’
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